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| Copper History |
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One of the famous Dead Sea Scrolls found in Israel is made of copper
instead of fragile animal skins. The scroll contains clues to a still
undiscovered treasure.
- Archeologists have recovered a portion of a water plumbing system
from the Pyramid of Cheops in Egypt. After 5,000 years, the copper
tubing was still in serviceable condition.
- A copper frying pan at the University of Pennsylvania's museum has
been dated to be more than 50 centuries old.
- When Columbus sailed to America, his ships (Nina, Pinta, and Santa
Maria) had copper skins below the water line. The copper sheathing
extended hull life and protected against barnacles and other types
of biofouling. Today, most sea-going vessels use a copper-based paint
for hull protection.
Archaeological evidence indicates that copper was used as far back
as 10,000 years ago in western Asia. During the prehistoric Chalcolithic
Period, societies discovered how to extract and use copper to produce
ornaments and implements. As early as the 3rd-4th Millennium BC, copper
was actively extracted from Spain's Huelva region. Around 2500 BC,
the discovery of useful properties of copper-tin alloys led to the
Bronze Age.
It has been documented that Israel's Timna Valley provided copper
for the Pharaohs. Papyrus records from ancient Egypt reveal that copper
was used to treat infections and sterilize water. The island of Cyprus
is known to have supplied much of the copper needed for the empires
of ancient Phoenicia, Greece, and Rome.
While the Greeks during Aristotle's era were familiar with brass,
it was not until Augustus' Imperial Rome that brass became abundantly
used. In South America, the pre-Columbian Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations
exploited copper, as well as gold and silver. During the Middle Ages,
copper and bronze flourished in China, India, and Japan.
The discoveries and inventions in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries
by Ampere, Faraday, and Ohm propelled copper into a new era. Demonstrating
excellent electrical conducting and heat transfer characteristics,
copper played a pivotal role in launching the Industrial Revolution.
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