Date: Thu, 08 Apr 1999 18:52:26 +0200
From: Bernd Pauli HD
[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Meteorite List
<meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
Subject: Native Americans and Meteorites - Part 3 of 6
Jeanne wrote:
> I was also wondering if your book mentions anything
> about Native American usage of Canyon Diablo irons
> for tools, amulets or other spiritual items.
BURKE J.G. (1986) Cosmic Debris - Meteorites in
History, pp. 223-225:
Other Indians besides the Hopewells buried meteorites
in graves. The Oktibbeha County meteorite was in an
Indian tumulus near Columbus, Mississippi.
An Indian grave at Livingston, Montana, consisting of
a
pile of rocks over the remains, yielded a 16-kg iron
meteorite in addition to stone tools, arrowheads, and
pieces of pottery.
The Camp Verde 61.5-kg iron is a transported piece of
the Canyon Diablo meteorite. In 1915 G.A. Dawson
opened a stone crypt in an ancient Indian building and
found the meteorite inside wrapped in a feather cloth.
Archaeologists have estimated the age of associated
pottery at about 800 years.
Similarly, maguey [Random House CD ROM: any of several
plants of the genus Agave, of the agave family, esp.
the cantala] cloths enveloped the 1,545-kg Casas
Grandes meteoritic iron, which was found before 1867
in a multichambered tomb in northern Chihuahua,
Mexico. Other chamberscontained human remains, which
were wrapped in the same way.
The Indians who buried these meteorites must have
regarded them not only with reverence but also as
possessing supernatural powers. What legends
do exist support this view.
The finder of the first mass of the Navajo, Arizona,
meteorite, which was buried under rocks, reported in
1921 that the Navajo Indians had known about the piece
for three centuries, but because it was sacred they
had covered it with rocks to conceal it from white men
and other tribes. Its weight of 1,500 kg probably
prevented
its transport. The second 683-kg mass, found five
years later just 48 meters from the first, was also
hidden under rocks, above which was a marker stone.
[Sadly we have here more stolen meteorites - E.P.]
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