I find the Hopewell use of meteoric iron fascinating -- they beat it into foil
(more or less) and used it to cover the surfaces of more mundane materials.
Apparently some relatively intact meteorite chunks were found in burials, more
as trade goods than objects of veneration -- the Hopewells were collectors
too! Has anyone ever done comparisons of the meteorites found in Hopewell
mounds and existing collections? Since several of the Hopewell meteorites were
pallasites (and we know how uncommon that subgroup is) it should be relatively
simple to determine which pallasite they are associated with. That would both
give us another marker about their trade networks, and benchmark for when the
pallasite fell, since the fall obviously predates collection, although the
events are not necessarily contemporaneous.
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