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Science 6 November 1998:
Vol. 282. no. 5391, pp. 1108 - 1111
DOI: 10.1126/science.282.5391.1108
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Reports

Early Central Andean Metalworking from Mina Perdida, Peru

Richard L. Burger, Robert B. Gordon

Copper and gold artifacts in contexts dated to ~3120 to 3020 carbon-14 years before the present (~1410 to 1090 calendar years B.C.) recovered in excavations at Mina Perdida, Lurín Valley, Peru, show that artisans hammered native metals into thin foils, in some cases with intermediate anneals. They gilded copper artifacts by attaching gold foil. The artifacts show that fundamental elements of the Andean metallurgical tradition were developed before the Chavín horizon, and that on the Peruvian coast the working of native copper preceded the production of smelted copper objects.

R. L. Burger, Peabody Museum of Natural History and Department of Anthropology, Yale University, Post Office Box 208277, New Haven, CT 06520-8277, USA. E-mail: richard.burger{at}yale.edu. R. B. Gordon, Department of Geology and Geophysics, Yale University, Post Office Box 208109, New Haven, CT 06520-8109, USA. E-mail: robert.gordon{at}yale.edu

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THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
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Variation in Holocene El Nino frequencies: Climate records and cultural consequences in ancient Peru.
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