Date: Thu, 08 Apr 1999 18:53:03 +0200
From: Bernd Pauli HD
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Meteorite List
<meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
Subject: Native Americans and Meteorites - Part 5 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:
Various North American Indian tribes, inhabiting an
area well over a million square miles, appear to have
had strikingly similar beliefs about meteorites and to
have carried out similar rites or practices. Despite
antagonism or enmity between tribes, it seems that
they
communicated tales and legends about these strange
objects, so that a common folklore developed around
meteorites. Given this circumstance, knowledge of any
observed fall and a description of the physical
condition of the resulting object would have been
rapidly broadcast.
Peary was convinced that the Eskimos of Melville Bay
observed the fall of the Cape York meteorite, "else
how could these rude natives have obtained any idea of
their heavenly origin, and why should not the
brown masses have been to them simply weeaksue (rocks)
like all the others in their country?"
But such is not necessarily the case. The Plains
Indians of the North American West and Southwest knew
their terrain, and heavy metal masses or even
blackened stones are not common features of the
countryside. Indians might well have attributed a
heavenly origin to
such rare objects when they came upon them.
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