Metalwork in New World Older Than Thought

WASHINGTON — Paper-thin metal fragments found at the site of an ancient Andean temple show that early Americans were trying to gild ornaments and possibly clothing more than 3,000 years ago, researchers said.

The copper and gold artifacts found at Mina Perdida on the Peruvian coast date back 3,400 years and show New World peoples experimented with metalwork long before they tried out smelting, said Richard Burger, an archaeologist at Yale University, who worked on the study.

"It was believed that during this period of time these cultures didn't work metals at all," he said in a telephone interview. "This offers initial evidence of metallurgy in the central Andes." Using carbon dating, the researchers found the pieces of hammered and cut metal dated from about 500 years before scientists had thought metalworking began in the New World.

The postage-stamp sized artifacts are still much younger than Old World counterparts from what is now Turkey, which are thought to date back around 8,000 years. But the Peruvian fragments show ancient peoples there hammered native metals into thin foils and attached gold to copper artifacts in first attempts at gilding.

Writing in the journal Science, the researchers said the gold and copper ornaments of the early artisans were less elaborate than during later periods, but the excavated foils offered clues to the origins of techniques that eventually led to the famed intricate designs of Andean civilizations. They found the artifacts at a large ceremonial center, built about 4,000 years ago, some 15 miles (24 km) south of Lima.

The excavated foils are too small for the scientists to determine what the objects might have looked like, but the location of the fragments on the summit and terraces of the temple probably meant the ornaments were used for religious and civic rituals, Burger said. "We assume they were used in costumes for ceremonies or in the actual ceremonies," he said.

Other evidence from the dig indicated the early artisans had begun experimenting with fire, because two metal fragments had been heated to provide greater flexibility and prevent cracking or breaking, Burger said. The interest in thin foils and gilding also illustrates what later became trademarks of metalworkers in the Andean region, he added. "Many of the distinctive characteristics of metalworking in the Andes are already occurring in this early stage."