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Copper tools beat stone every time for precision work on bone artifacts
I watched a dig team in Flagstaff spend two days scraping at a bison scapula with flint flakes. They chipped a critical groove right through a butchery mark. Switched them to a copper awl from a hobbyist metalsmith and they finished three more bones in one afternoon with zero damage. Anyone else notice how much cleaner the cut marks are with copper versus chert?
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nina_harris6mo ago
Hold up, copper leaves its own kind of marks that can confuse stuff later. I've seen that softer metal smear over surface details in a way flint just doesn't. You sure those cleaner cuts didn't rub out some fine lines you needed?
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wadeyoung4mo ago
Riley595, I've seen copper smear hide tool marks so bad you couldn't even date a piece after. @nina_harris is spot on there.
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riley5956mo ago
@nina_harris i get where you're coming from but i've seen way more damaged pieces from people chipping at bone with flint than from copper smearing. those cleaner cuts actually let you see the original marks better since copper doesn't shatter and skip across the surface like chert does. in my experience the smearing is way easier to clean up than a gouge that ruins the whole artifact.
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