Then there's that whole thing where people were mining copper next to Lake Superior in effectively industrial amounts...and sending it...somehwere far away. I can't affix a screencap of some classic summaries of that, but there's been compelling work done on the transoceanic/transhemispheric trade in copper during the Bronze Age.
During the Bronze Age, 3500 to 1000 BC, five thousand copper mines were excavated on the south shore of Lake Superior. Millions of pounds of copper were extracted. Only a miniscule fraction of this copper can be accounted for among the artifacts of Native Americans.
So where did all of this copper go? Increasing evidence suggests that it went to Europe.
This is a frustrating topic to search on in lo these days of the massively censored and massaged internet. Unless you use massively honed search fu, and know what search terms to use, all you will ever find is a bunch of government agancy and academic garbage about how The First Coppersmiths In The New World Were Native Americans.
Then there's that whole thing where people were mining copper next to Lake Superior in effectively industrial amounts...and sending it...somehwere far away. I can't affix a screencap of some classic summaries of that, but there's been compelling work done on the transoceanic/transhemispheric trade in copper during the Bronze Age.
https://chapelboro.com/town-square/columns/common-science/bronze-age-part-ii-the-case-of-the-missing-copper
https://archive.is/XgIec
The deleted Part 1, linked in that text, is here archived:
https://archive.is/iRSop
This is a frustrating topic to search on in lo these days of the massively censored and massaged internet. Unless you use massively honed search fu, and know what search terms to use, all you will ever find is a bunch of government agancy and academic garbage about how The First Coppersmiths In The New World Were Native Americans.