The Metallurgy and Technology of Gold and Platinum among the Pre-Columbian Indians byPaul BergsøeReview by: M. F. Ashley-MontaguIsis, Vol. 28, No. 2 (May, 1938), pp. 529-531Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/225728 .

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REVIEWS 529

Paul Bergs0e. - The Metallurgy and Technology of Gold and Platinum among the Pre-Columbian Indians. Ingeni0rvidenskabelige Skrifter Nr. A 44, Danmarks Naturvidenskabelige Samfund, K0benhavn, I937, (2 Kroner). Pag. 45.

This exemplary study, without any possible doubt, puts all other studies of a similar kind into the shade. It cannot be too highly praised, for not only is it a work well done, original, novel, enlightening, and important, but it is also thoroughly sound, eminently cautious, exhaustive in its method, and from every point of view an outstanding contribution to the story of the metallurgical and technological activities of early civilizations. Yet the work is in no sense elaborate, but is simplicity and lucidity itself, and though it covers a great deal this is achieved in the short space of 36 pages of actual text.

PAUL BERGS0E, who in this paper shows himself the possessor of art admirably clear mind, is the Vice-President of the Danish Association of Metallurgical Research, and a practising metallurgical engineer. Though nowhere is the statement explicitly made in this study, it appears that a few years ago BERGS0E visited Esmeraldas, La Tolita, and Atacames on the northern coast of Ecuador, where by archaeological methods and surface panning he recovered a large number of small articles, im- plements and trinkets, all of which had been worked in gold or platinum or both. Some 8o of these objects are figured in four plates. With the exception of four exquisitely wrought ones, all of these objects are of pre-Columbian age, but beyond saying this much the exact age of these objects cannot, at present, be determined.

The objects discovered at Esmeraldas comprise fishing-hooks, awls or eyleteers, tweezers for removing hair or picking up small particles of metal, nippers or forceps, clothes eyes, pins, safety-pins, sewing-needles, nails and tacks, spoons with handles formed like snakes, nose-rings, ear- buttons, skin-plugs (?), rings for fingers or toes, trinkets with loose hanging ornaments, pendants, minute beads, minute masks, and miscel- laneous trinkets of unknown use.

At Atacames a unique safety-pin was discovered. This "pin fits into a closed guard or catch in a manner exactly similar to the safety-pins used in our hospitals to-day. The only difference is that the catch, instead of being placed at the end, is fixed to the side of the pin" (p.I2).

BERGS0E suggests that it may have been used to secure two clothes eyes, for nothing quite resembling clothes hooks for fastening eyes has been found. It is tempting to think that we have here a case of independent invention for this safety-pin is quite unlike any safety-pin from the Bronze Age to the present day with which I am acquainted ; such a

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530 ISIS, XXVIII, 2

speculation would, however, be premature in the present diaphanous state of South American archaeology.

At La Tolita a considerable number of nails were discovered. In a few cases the head and body were of gold, but in most of these nails the body is made of copper and the head of gold. NORDENSKIOLD found small bronze nails in a wooden handle recovered near Ica on the Peruvian coast, but elsewhere in South America nails are completely unknown; even to-day "nailing" is rare among the Indians of South America.

Much of the filigree and hammered. work described and figured in these pages would command the unreserved admiration of the modem goldsmith, so exquisitely well is it made. The beads from La Tolita are really masterpieces in their own right. "The greater part of these beads consists of 6 tiny gold balls forming a circle and held in place by two little rings of gold wire, on above and one below... These beads being from two to four millimeters in diameter, it is obvious that we have a piece of work before us which demands almost inconceivable skill for its accomplishment." (pp. I5-I6).

Having described the objects earlier named BERGS0E then enters upon a discussion of the results of the metallurgical examination of the material. One of the remarkable facts in this way revealed is that "these people (of La Tolita) not only succeeded in obtaining platinum in coherent form, but were even acquainted with a method of using this platinum for plating other metals". (p. 17).

Platinum, it will be recalled, was not known in Europe until about I730, being first described by SCHEFFER in I752, ** but it was not until the middle of the igth Century that the problem of rendering the metal usable was solved. That the pre-Columbian Indians of La Tolita were able to bring platinum into a coherent and serviceable form, as is shown by an analysis of their "pure platinum", which actually turns out to be an alloy of platinum with some gold and a little of the silver naturally associated with gold, is an achievement of a remarkable order. How this was actually done BERGS0E has discovered and here tells. The process was quite simple, but it is one that is entirely new to metallurgical systematists. Interested readers must be referred to BERGS0E's original account where the story is briefly told. Had the Spaniards been less interested in the pursuit of gold and the extermination of the Indians, and paid some attention to the work of the people upon whom they had come like a scourge, the whole use of platinum in Europe might have

(* *) There are a few earlier descriptions but only by a few years, see MARY ELVIRA WEEKS: The discovery of the elements (Easton, Pa., 1933, 99 ff.; Isis 21,

455). G. S.

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REVIEWS 531

taken a very different turn to that which it subsequently took. It is an interesting thought.

BERGS0E'S metallurgical analyses, his discussion of the variety of tech- nical processes used in the manufacture of these minute articles, his accounts of his own technical examinations of the material by spectro- scopic, microscopic, and other means, and his brief discussions of the ethnological, archaeological, and historical problems involved, must always remain an admirable example to others of what can be done towards the elucidation of a people's cultural activities by a clear minded investigator.

I have given but- a slight indication of the riches which are to be found in this short study, but I hope it has been sufficient to suggest something of its value. There is a brief bibliography. The translation by F. C. REYNOLDS is excellent.

New York University. M. F. ASHLEY-MONTAGU

J. B. Rhine.-New Frontiers of the Mind. Pp. 275, New York: FARRAR & RINEHART, 1937, ($ 2.50).

In I935 Professor J. B. RHINE published a work entitled Extra-Sensory Perception, (Boston), in which an account was given of certain experiments carried out in the Department of Psychology at Duke University, from which it appeared that certain individuals were possessed of powers of mind of which science knows not and which science is alleged never to consider. The ability to perceive things without the apparent use of the five senses, that is, any one or more of the acknowledged five senses, Professor RHINE calls extra-sensory perception, or ESP for short. In the present work he gives a more detailed and more exhaustive account of his work and experiments than is to be found in the earlier volume.

The answer to the question " What is mind " used to be " No matter, and to the question " What is matter," it was more often than not, " Never mind." Today the distinction between matter and mind is less frequently made, the trend being all in the opposite direction. Mental functions and the functions of a brick wall tend to be regarded as much of a sameness, the mind and the brick wall functioning in their different ways owing to a difference in their molecular organization. But their elements fundamentally are of a similar structural character. BERTRAND RUSSELL, for example, has suggested the existence of a " neutral stuff " which organized in one way functions as matter, and organized in another way functions as mind. It is conceivable that just as different atomic organizations give rise to different chemical elements, so may such different organizations of physically irreducible ions give rise to the phenomena of mind and those of a brick wall. Students of the

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