Oldest obsidian bracelet reveals amazing craftsmen's skills in the eighth millennium BC

Originally posted by BohemianBrim
ok the actual picture shows its just a tiny piece of what may or MAY NOT be a bracelet. and that tiny chunk looks NOTHING CLOSE to the digital reconstruction, except for how they imagine the general shape to be.

all those cool facets that make that digital image worth oooing and awwing over are not in the original.. which is just a tiny shard that... honestly... how on earth did they decide it was a bracelet? how could they possibly have recognized it as ANYTHING? it could be anything at all its so small, why do they assume it just continued on its small arch into a circle? why not some other way to form something else? and why a bracelet?

is this really all archeology is? people guessing what things look like?

I've taken a close look at the original "shard" which appears to be approximately 1/8th of a "possible" circumference of a circular object .... and completely agree with you in that I also fail to see any justification in extrapolating a complete 360 degree's from just that tiny sample.
And again, where's the justification in stating so categorically that it MUST be a bracelet ? There are any number of simple geometrical shapes besides a circle that that shard could have originally been a part of.

Talk about jumping to conclusions and "bringing into existence" a highly sophisticated society based on little more than a piece of "something"

We are naturally inclined to say 'It shouldn't be there'. But it is. Unless this object is a fraud (-no reason to think so-) the standard model of history has to be rejected. But if you've already rejected what you've been told to think, this evidence fits in very nicely with other 'out of place' evidence:

OOParts, Baalbek, Giants, Antarctica, India, etc.

(sample: )

What is a brass bell with an iron clapper doing in coal that is supposed to be hundreds of millions of years old? According to Norm Scharbough's book Ammunition (which includes a compilation of many such "coal anecdotes") the bell was extensively analyzed at the University of Oklahoma and it was found to contain an unusual mixture of metals, different from any modern usage

Whoops.

...fossilized human skull was found in coal that was sold in Germany (mid-1800s). A jawbone of a child was found in coal in Tuscany (1958). Two giant human molars were found in Montana (1926). A human leg was found by a West Virginia coal miner. It had changed into coal.

(Taken from Out of place artifacts and other things: Update and Review 2010)

Hopefully enough to whet the appetite of those with an open mind to keep digging.

There comes a point where 'whoops' becomes 'I've been had'. Archaeologists who automatically assume incredibly intricatly-designed objects such as this to be nothing but a bracelet have minds that are encased in an impenetrable a priori framework. Maybe they do wonder from time to time. But if they admitted it they would find their articles rejected and their research funding in serious jeopardy.

People think adults grow out of 'peer pressure'. Not so. It just becomes more polite. And more insidious.

Originally posted by Wildmanimal
reply to post by Maxmars

 

I am sure you realize just how difficult it would be actually to create something like that
10k years ago. Obsidian has a tendancy to fracture. Hence the razor sharp edges.
It is very glasslike and has a hardness of 5- 5.5.
In fact, It would be a great contest to see this reproduced today without using ANY electrically
powered tools.
Is it possible, well obviously as this specimen exists.
Amazing what people can do without T.V.,Computers, and all the other current distractions
of our current era on the human timeline.

We should be careful to make sure it is not fraudulent.
It wouldn't be the first time.

I wonder if it would fit me?

S&F

What about heating it up and spinning it like a clay pot ?
Then using wood or stone tools to shape it ?

Originally posted by pause4thought
We are naturally inclined to say 'It shouldn't be there'. But it is. Unless this object is a fraud (-no reason to think so-)

You mean apart from the fact that it was "found" by a 10 yr old boy who kept it doe 60 years before telling anyone, it looks remarkably similar to other bells with the Hindu deity Garuda on them except it looks like it's been filed down, and here's nothing particularly odd about the brass??

Yeah - apart from those minor inconveniences there's no reason to suppose it isn't genuine!!

Absolutely amazing!

We can clearly call this object, whatever it is, an Out Of Place Artifact.

More we dig more I'm convinced that there is an hidden history of the humanity behind us!
S&F.

The Carlos museum has some wonderful old artifacts - and it was the jewelry that simply stunned me.

www.carlos.emory.edu...

They have some very old Greek earrings that just blew me away - they were much better crafted than most of the fine jewelry you see today!

We lost technology - maybe it was when that horrible famine came through Egypt way back when, I dunno, but India had amazing stuff too that is older than it should be - I mean, if you listen to people saying 3k bc was when Egypt was building pyramids...and believe it - I don't believe it.

No, people had technology at one time and they LOST it. BAD.

What if astrology was really tied to a very, very old technology. We lose most of it because it took a lot of education to understand it- just say - people fell back to subsistance survival and could not study for years and years. Astrology then would lose much of it's effectiveness. It might be like having a keyboard and no computer. So then people say "What good is this keyboard? You just THINK it does something, it is not a real machine because it does not produce anything!' Add in a helping of a religion saying "keyboards are from the devil"

Pretty soon you might end up with an engraved plank that a few people just KNOW there's something too if they can only figure it out, and everyone else laughs at them.

I'm just using that as an example, because i don't think people 4,000 years ago in classical Greece were any less smart or well reasoned than we are TODAY.

There was some science - there was - and we lost it.

Originally posted by Aloysius the Gaul

Originally posted by pause4thought
We are naturally inclined to say 'It shouldn't be there'. But it is. Unless this object is a fraud (-no reason to think so-)

You mean apart from the fact that it was "found" by a 10 yr old boy who kept it doe 60 years before telling anyone, it looks remarkably similar to other bells with the Hindu deity Garuda on them except it looks like it's been filed down, and here's nothing particularly odd about the brass??..

When it comes to the bell that was a very good response. I admit I was not aware of the weakness of that evidence, (—although it constitutes only one of several examples of human artefacts found in coal).

Yet what I said above was specifically referring to the object discussed in the OP. While no evidence for fraud has been presented it will clearly challenge the idea that the people of the time had only primitive abilities.

reply to post by Maxmars

Sorry, that image is a reconstruction. What the researchers actually discovered was one small fragment, barely ten degrees out of 360. Anyone who wants to see the fragment can click the link in your opening post, and enlarge the tiny, easy-to-miss picture at the head of the article.

This artefact would probably have been made on a primitive lathe – basically a straight hardwood rod, like an an arrow, turned using a string wound round it, the same technique used by stone age humans to make fire with a bow drill.

Once the basic shape had been turned, the bracelet would have been made smooth and symmetrical by the use of progressively finer abrasives. It would have taken an amazingly long time to do, but time was something our hunter-gatherer ancestors were very rich in.

People seeing late Stone Age artefacts like this one for the first time are usually amazed by their ingenuity, craftsmanship and finish. The first time I saw a set of Neolithic chalcedony bangles from Java I was astounded by their smoothness and perfect circularity – not to mention their beauty.

What we forget is that these objects were made by people who were essentially just the same as we are. Why should they not have been as keen on perfection as we are, and as willing to take the time and trouble to achieve it?

reply to post by Maxmars


But how can it be 10,000 years old when the world is only 6,000 years old...(end sarcasm)...

Brilliant craftsmanship...raises so many questions...

reply to post by BohemianBrim



I agree with you and I get annoyed with so called scientists and researchers who make this stuff up. They are con artists.

It happens a lot with space science. They see a tiny speck of light somewhere and extrapolate it into an entire planetary system and start talking about earth like places. They have no idea what they are talking about and the best is nobody can ever find out if what they say is true because we will all be a long time dead before it can be shown to be utter rubbish.

Without wishing to start a different arguement I would put the AGW crowd in the same category. They are making money today from a theory that will take so long to prove or disprove.

reply to post by jrmcleod


Now Jamie...where on earth do you get 6,000 from?
Also and off topic...you going to do a thread about this 'heatwave we are going to get over Christmas? Could be fun!

The 'lumps' inside the bracelet make me think of binary code...just my take

Rainbows with tinsel
Jane

reply to post by Wildmanimal


It would be a contest with no winners. Obsidian is far too fragile to create anything like the object shown. I have seen the work of some of the finest flint knappers alive and nobody could do anything remotely like this to the degree of accuracy claimed. Nor would making a bracelet from anything so fragile make much sense.
Where and how did they come up with the date for this object?
Photos of the actual object would have been nice as well.
Not to throw cold water on this Max but I would need more proof of these claims.

reply to post by Asktheanimals

Here are a couple of Neolithic obsidian mirrors. As you can see, they are pretty smooth.

I agree it would have been difficult to make this sort of object, but I certainly don’t think it is impossible. It wouldn’t have been made by knapping but, as I said in my earlier post, was probably turned on a primitive lathe and then carefully and gently polished to its final finish.

You are right about the fragility of obsidian; it is, after all, a kind of glass. However, artefacts of this kind probably were not meant for daily wear. They may not even have been meant to be worn at all. Paleolithic hand-axes have been found that a single man can barely lift. Obviously they were not used as tools; they were ceremonial objects of some kind. This probably was, too.

reply to post by Maxmars


That is truly amazing ! I live in Kentucky and I have found tools and points and 1 peice of jewelry that was made in the Archaic time period and it is amazing what they did with stone and other materials. Thanks for sharing.

I watched a program a short period back and they talked about Obsidian volcanic glass. They said it is so sharp that modern day surgeons are using scalpels made from it because it causes less trauma to the skin at the insision site than stainless steel. If this object is indeed genuine, I would have to guess that it was made by " The Gods" as a gift to a earth woman. I still refuse to give The Ancients full credit for the many astounding creations that have been found. I think mankind is going to get knocked out of his or her socks over the next 3 years, and the truth will be known.....

Obsidian Trade in the Near East, 12,000-6,500BC

This page is very interesting and relevant to the thread. It shows, using maps, how the trade in obsidian grew from sources in Turkey over a period of almost six thousand years, beginning at the end of the glacial period (the 'ice age') and continuing until the beginning of the Bronze Age. This is the (pre)historical background against which the object we are discussing must be viewed. Obsidian was a commonly used material for tools and jewellery throughout that period.

Obsidian, a black volcanic glass, was first recognized... in the 1960s as a uniquely sensitive indicator of prehistoric trade, both because of the great desirability of this material before the use of metals, and also because the trace-elements it contains are usually diagnostic of individual sources. Work on Near Eastern obsidian in the Neolithic period has been a particular focus of interest, and a summary of current results has been published... from which the information in the following maps has been extracted. They indicate a remarkable story, from limited circulation (though still over impressive distances) by late-Pleistocene hunter-gatherers, to its increasing use by the first farming communities...

Originally posted by Tippys Dad
I've often wondered about our modern take on history. Humans - in our present form - have been around for almost 200,000 years or more, yet most of our technology has evolved in the last few thousand years? It's like we spent 198,000 years herding goats and then reached present technology in the last few millenium. It just doesn't add up. I think we have lost a lot of our history somewhere along the way, maybe due to natural disaster or a devastating war. Or something.

Way more recent than that. Most 95% of the technology we enjoy today was created/developed/perfected in the last FIFTY (50) years!

The acceleration of [everything] is really quite remarkable.

Maxmars,
Thanks good find,
Absolutely amazing they seem to have both the skills and technology to produce this so long ago.

History is being re written every day esp in regards to our deep past and unknown origins, I find this both fascinating and exciting, some great further info from members to thanks again all.

Kind Regards,

Elf

Why the OP didn't post the photo of actual object?



Big leap of imagination if you ask me.

Why people are making speculation about the "Digital reconstruction" of the bracelet proposed by Mohamed Ben Tkaya and talking about binary code insde...

reply to post by Maxmars


It truly is a remarkable piece no doubt about that,people are way to quick to judge people from yesteryear don't you think?