Old Copper complex

Old Copper complex
Map showing the extent of the Old Copper complex
Copper knife, spearpoints, awls, and spud (adze), from the Late Archaic period, Wisconsin, 3000 BC-1000 BCE.
Geographical rangeGreat Lakes
PeriodArchaic
Dates6500 – 1000 BCE
Type siteCopper Culture State Park

The Old Copper complex or Old Copper culture is an archaeological culture from the Archaic period of North America's Great Lakes region. Artifacts from some of these sites have been dated from 6500 to 1580 BCE.[page needed] It is characterized by widespread copper artifacts, including tools and weapons, as well as ornamental objects.

Western Great Lakes

The Old Copper complex of the Western Great Lakes is the best known, and can be dated to around 6,500 BCE. Great Lakes natives of the Archaic period located 99% pure copper near Lake Superior, in veins touching the surface and in nuggets from gravel beds. Major quarries were located on Isle Royale, the Keweenaw Peninsula, and the Brule River, and copper was deposited elsewhere by glaciation as well.

By heating, annealing and hammering, these cultures worked the copper into shape and produced a variety of spearpoints, tools and decorative objects. In addition to their own use, the Copper Complex peoples traded copper goods for other exotic materials. By about 1,000 BCE, copper was increasingly restricted to jewelry and other status-related items, rather than tools. This is thought to represent the development of more complex social hierarchies in the area.

Oconto Site

The Copper Culture State Park, in Oconto, northeastern Wisconsin, contains an ancient burial ground called the Oconto Site used by the Old Copper complex culture between around 4,000 and 2,000 BCE. It was rediscovered in June 1952 by a 13-year-old boy who unearthed human bones while playing in an old gravel quarry. Upon receiving the news, Reuben La Fave and George Hall of the Oconto County Historical Society carried out test excavations, uncovering burials accompanied by copper artifacts. By July, Dr. Robert E. Ritzenthaler and Arthur Niehoffof the Milwaukee Public Museum began the first archaeological excavation as a part of a Wisconsin Archaeological Survey program.

45 individuals were excavated from pits within burial ground. The majority of the burials were flexed and bundle burials, and some held multiple individuals within a singular grave. 26 copper artifacts were recovered, among these being awls, crescents, clasps, a socketed-tang point, fishtail point, ovoid point, fish hook, bracelet, spiral coiled tubing, rivet, and a spatula.

See also

References

Citations

  1. 1 2 Pompeani et al. 2021, p. 16: "The 14
    C     ages presented herein and by Reardon (2014) push back the oldest known copper artifact age to at least 7690 ± 40 BP (ca. 8500 cal BP)"
  2. ↑ Pleger 2000.
  3. ↑ Gibbon 1998, p. 28.
  4. ↑ Pleger 2003.
  5. ↑ Emerson, McElrath & Fortier 2009, p. 709.
  6. ↑ Marder 2005, p. 28.
  7. ↑ "Copper Culture State Park". Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Retrieved July 28, 2017. Copper Culture State Park was the site of a prehistoric cemetery of the Old Copper Complex people who occupied the northern Midwest from ca. 4000 – 2000 BC.
  8. ↑ "rootsweb: Werrebroeck Farmhouse". Archived from the original on 2012-09-02. Retrieved 2013-04-16.
  9. ↑ Onconto Site National Register of Historic Places Inventory Nomination Form, United States Department of the Interior (Form), vol. 10–300, p. 2
  10. ↑ "Old Copper Sites Excavated by The Milwaukee Public Museum". Milwaukee Public Museum. Retrieved 24 October 2026.

Sources

  • Emerson, Thomas E.; McElrath, Dale L.; Fortier, Andrew C. (2009). Archaic Societies: Diversity and Complexity Across the Midcontinent. New York: SUNY Press. ISBN 9781441607850.
  • Gibbon, Guy (February 1998). "Old Copper in Minnesota: A Review". Plains Anthropologist. 43 (163): 27–50. doi:10.1080/2052546.1998.11931881. JSTOR 25669519.
  • Marder, William (2005). Indians in the Americas: The Untold Story. San Diego: Book Tree. ISBN 9781585091041.
  • Neiburger, E. J. (April 1987). "Did Midwest Pre-Columbian Indians Cast Metal? A New Look". Central States Archaeological Journal. 34 (2): 60–74. JSTOR 43138520.
  • Pleger, Thomas C. (Fall 2000). "Old copper and red ocher social complexity". Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology. 25 (2): 169–190. JSTOR 20708133.
  • Pleger, Thomas C. (2003). "A Brief Introduction to the Old Copper Complex of the Western Great Lakes: 4000-1000 BC". Proceedings of the Twenty-Seventh Annual Meeting of the Forest History Association of Wisconsin. Oconto. pp. 10–18.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  • Pompeani, David P.; Steinman, Byron A.; Abbott, Mark B.; et al. (April 2021). "On the timing of the Old Copper complex in North America: A comparison of radiocarbon dates from different archaeological contexts". Radiocarbon. 63 (2): 513–531. Bibcode:2021Radcb..63..513P. doi:10.1017/RDC.2021.7.

Further reading

  • Byers, A. Martin (April 1999). "Intentionality, Symbolic Pragmatics, and Material Culture: Revisiting Binford's View of the Old Copper Complex". American Antiquity. 64 (2): 265–287. doi:10.2307/2694278. JSTOR 2694278.
  • Malakoff, David (19 March 2021). "Ancient Native Americans were among the world's first coppersmiths". Science. doi:10.1126/science.abi6135.
  • Wittry, Warren L.; Ritzenthaler, Robert E. (January 1956). "The Old Copper Complex: An Archaic Manifestation in Wisconsin". American Antiquity. 21 (3): 244–254. doi:10.2307/277196. JSTOR 277196.
  • Wittry, Warren L. (1951). "A Preliminary Study of the Old Copper Complex". Wisconsin Archaeologist. 32 (1): 1–18.