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The life (lives) and times of native copper inNorthwest North AmericaH. Kory Cooper aa Purdue University

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To cite this article: H. Kory Cooper (2011): The life (lives) and times of native copper in Northwest NorthAmerica, World Archaeology, 43:2, 252-270

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The life (lives) and times of native copperin Northwest North America

H. Kory Cooper

Abstract

Native copper was used by several different indigenous ethno-linguistic groups in Alaska and Yukonstarting in the Late Prehistoric period and continuing into the early twentieth century. This paperapplies a relational biography approach to an analysis of the possible roles of native copper in

northern Athabascan and northern Tlingit society. Native copper was used in a variety of contexts,both as practical and prestige technology, and also possessed animacy and agency, two importantand closely intertwined concepts in the ontology of northern hunter-gatherers.

Keywords

Athabascan; native copper; hunter-gatherer; animacy; agency; object biography.

Native copper (copper occurring in a pure metallic state, 99.9þ per cent Cu) was used by

several indigenous groups in south-central Alaska and southwestern Yukon including:

Ahtna, Dena’ina, Tutchone, Upper Tanana and Tanana Athabascans, Yakutat and other

northern Tlingit and Chugach Eskimo (Fig. 1). In this paper I follow an object biography

approach in examining the roles of native copper in indigenous society. This analysis

capitalizes on the convergence of material culture studies (e.g. Bennett 2010; Brey 2005;

Gell 1998; Hoskins 2006), archaeology (e.g. Alberti and Marshall 2009; Brown

and Walker 2008; Bruck 2006; Haber 2009; Zedeno 2009) and non-Western ontologies

(Bird-David 1999; Ingold 2000, 2006) regarding the attribution of animacy and agency to

non-human things. Ethnographic studies provide a wealth of information regarding this

world-wide phenomenon and it is a central tenet of northern Athabascan ontology (e.g.

Boraas and Peter 2008; de Laguna 1969; Nelson 1983; Osgood 1966; Ridington 1982,

1988, 1994). The potential for objects to have animacy and agency makes a biographical

approach (Gosden and Marshall 1999; Kopytoff 1986) useful to the study of northern

Athabascan archaeology and material culture. This discussion provides an example of

World Archaeology Vol. 43(2): 252–270 New Approaches to Stone Mines and Quarries:

Materials and Materiality

ª 2011 Taylor & Francis ISSN 0043-8243 print/1470-1375 online

DOI: 10.1080/00438243.2011.581444

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the inseparability of ideology, material culture and ranking (social complexity) among

hunter-gatherers, and puts ‘the magic back’ into metallurgy by highlighting the non-

material, ideological aspects of native copper innovation (Budd and Taylor 1995: 138).

Animacy, agency and biography

Indigenous ontologies attributing life (soul or spirit and emotion) to non-human animals

and objects have traditionally been described in anthropology using the term animism

(Ingold 2006: 10), an early focus of study in anthropology (Tylor 1958 [1871]). Animism

was viewed as an early stage in the evolution of religious thought and characterized as a

childlike mistaken epistemology (see discussion by Bird-David 1999: 67–8). Its

classification as religion (Groleau 2009: 398) and emphasis on spirits combined with the

ethnographic attention given to ritual ‘over-exoticiz[ed]’ (Sillar 2009: 374) animism,

distancing it from daily life. But animacy is ‘a condition of being in’, not ‘a way of

believing about’, the world (Ingold 2006: 10). Referring to indigenous non-Western

theories as epistemologies (world-views) instead of ontologies (worlds) reifies the Western

Cartesian duality of active people/passive objects and projects it onto people who

experience the world differently. Recent studies of animism and agency have focused on

the interdependence of humans and non-human agents as relational (Sillar 2009) or, more

specifically, as a relational epistemology (Bird-David 1999) or relational ontology (Alberti

and Marshall 2009; Ingold 2006; Viveiros de Castro 2003).

In this paper I use ontology, rather than epistemology, as it better articulates the

experiential relationship northern Athabascans have with their environment on both a

Figure 1 Ethnolinguistic map of study region showing place names of locations of copper and

significant archaeological sites.

Native copper in Northwest North America 253

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physical and a metaphysical level. Similarly, because of the negative implications

associated with the term animism, this paper follows Zedeno (2009) in using animacy to

refer to the agentive potential of non-human animals and things. This perspective

emphasizes that relational ontology is deeply embedded in social practice, learning and the

experiences of individuals, and not just a set of religious beliefs to be drawn on at special

occasions (Zedeno 2009: 408).

The metaphorical analogy between the trajectory of a human life and that of an object

has appealed to many scholars interested in material culture (Herva and Nurmi 2009: 161).

Just as humans are born, move through successive stages of life and then die, objects are

made, have a use-life and are discarded (Schiffer 1972: 159, 1987). Whereas Schiffer (1972:

156, 1987: 13) used ‘life history’ to denote the various processes in a systemic context that

impact on the form of an object, Appadurai (1986: 3) used ‘social lives’ to emphasize the

changes that can occur in the meaning and value of objects in the context of exchange.

Kopytoff (1986: 66–7) also focused on the context of exchange when he applied cultural

anthropology’s use of biography in developing generalized human life cycles (‘idealized

biographies’) to discuss the ‘cultural biography’ of objects. Asking similar questions about

the biography of objects as one asked about the biographies of people would provide a

better understanding of the changing value of commodities as they moved through a social

network (Kopytoff 1986: 64). The concept of biography incorporates use-life but is more

inclusive because it also recognizes that objects are employed to create and maintain

identity and social relations (Gosden and Marshall 1999: 169; Jones 2002: 84; Joy 2009:

545), including relations with non-human agents (Zedeno 2009). Brown and Walker (2008:

298) used ‘object agency’ to highlight the fact that objects and their ‘performance

characteristics’ impact on human behavior. In Western ontology objects do not have

goals, so the agency of an object is ‘relational’: it exists in only relation to a ‘patient’

(counterpart to an agent) (Gell 1998: 22). In non-Western ontologies things with animacy

can exert their will upon humans. They are animate because they have agency, and they

are agentive because they have animacy; the two attributes are inseparable.

Metals, minerals and shells were appreciated in North America and elsewhere for their

visual appeal (Hayden 1998; Renfrew 1986) and association with supernatural spirits and

power (Saunders 1998, 2002). Native American consultants working with Zedeno (2009:

412) referred to copper, red paint, fossils and crystals as ‘inherently animate’. Such

materials are often referred to as prestige goods by archaeologists (e.g. Brumfiel and Earle

1987) due to their presence in special contexts such as human burials and are used to infer

socioeconomic inequality and, by extension, social complexity (Hayden 1998). Prestige

technologies are meant to be shown in community contexts where their ability to ‘elicit

pan-human aesthetic responses’ can be used to attract the positive attention of potential

followers, allies and mates (Hayden 1998: 13). Embedded in Gell’s (1988: 7) concept of the

‘technology of enchantment’ is the idea that the human imagination is greatly affected by

objects that stimulate our senses and cause us to question our understanding of the world.

The political use of prestige technology to initiate or expand social relations connects its

value and exchange (Appadurai 1986: 57). The association of metals and metallurgy with

leaders and leadership has been attributed to the transformative (Budd and Taylor 1995)

and sensorily stimulating (Herbert 1984) physical, and hence spiritual, qualities of copper

and other metals.

254 H. Kory Cooper

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Northern Athabascan ontology and technology

Northern Athabascans are divided into twenty-three separate languages spread across the

Subarctic from the Alaskan interior in the west, east to the south-west corner of Hudson

Bay and extending south into the Canadian Plains (Krauss and Golla 1981: 67–8). The

Ahtna and other northern Athabascans were traditionally hunter-gatherer-fishers. Salmon

and caribou were the two most important species in the past and are still important today.

Good fishing locations might be occupied much of the year and become important centers

of trade but there was a great deal of seasonal mobility (Ives 1990; de Laguna and

McClellan 1981; McClellan and Denniston 1981; VanStone 1974). Northern Athabascans

self-identified with small local bands but movement between bands was facilitated by kin

ties created through the exchange of marriage partners. Northern Athabascans have been

characterized as egalitarian but at the time of Russian contact, in the mid to late

eighteenth century, the Ahtna, Dena’ina and Tutchone were ranked societies with nobles,

slaves and commoners (Ives 1990; Townsend 1980; VanStone 1974).

Northern Athabascan technology has been characterized by both archaeologists and

ethnographers as materially sparse, many tools were made using readily available animal

or plant materials (e.g. Dumond 1980; McClellan and Denniston 1981; Nelson 1983;

Oswalt 1976; Ridington 1982, 1988, 1994; VanStone 1974). The foundation of northern

Athabascan technology is the intimate, socially constructed knowledge of the environment

and animal behavior (Nelson 1983; Ridington 1982, 1988, 1994). Much of this information

is encoded in stories about proper behavior toward nature (animals, plants, landscape)

and nature spirits (supernatural) from the Distant Time when non-human life had human

characteristics (de Laguna 1969; McClellan and Denniston 1981; Nelson 1983: 16–19).

Distant Time stories provide an oral manual for proper interaction with sentient beings

aware of humans’ adherence to these rules, such as proper distribution and disposal of the

parts of an animal by a hunter (Boraas and Peter 2008; Nelson 1983). Views of animism

distanced it from daily practice (Groleau 2009: 398; Sillar 2009: 374) but the concept of

animacy is an integral part of northern Athabascan ontology and technology. The

potential for animacy and agency found in the environment means that hunting, fishing

and gathering are ritual and spiritual acts by which northern Athabascans maintain social

relations with their ‘watchful world’ (Nelson 1983: 14).

Animacy is not a substitute for detailed knowledge of the environment. Landscapes are

dynamic cultural constructions tied to cultural perceptions of the environment (e.g.

Anschuetz et al. 2001; Basso 1996; Ingold 2000) and an important aspect of the northern

Athabascan landscape and technology is the use of resource-specific place names. A

consistent naming system was established by northern Athabascans allowing place names,

especially for streams and mountains, to be easily memorized and used as ‘cognitive maps’

(Kari 1996: 465, 2011). Most Ahtna place names are environmental, derived from

names for plants and animals or landscape features, but some are derived from specific

historical or Distant Time events (Kari 1996, 2005, 2011: 248–50; Nelson 1983: 243–5).

The northern Athabascan landscape is alive with history and memory (e.g. Andrews 2004;

Nelson 1983). Because there is no separation between natural-supernatural in northern

Athabascan ontology, or society-nature and society-technology, humans are constantly

and simultaneously interacting with other humans, animals, objects and the landscape

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both physically and metaphysically developing and experiencing their ‘local theory of

relatedness’ (Haber 2009: 424).

Native copper biography(ies)

Details about an object’s manufacture, use, exchange and deposition can be investigated

using a variety of methods (Jones 2002), but cultural anthropologists can write more

detailed biographies of people (Watson and Watson-Franke 1985) than can be established

for individual archaeological artifacts (Herva and Nurmi 2009: 162; Joy 2009: 543). I

address this issue three ways. First, I examine the biographical possibilities of native

copper in different forms and contexts, instead of a single artifact (following Kopytoff’s

(1986: 66–8) suggestion to focus on a class of artifact). Second, I follow Joy’s ‘relational

biography’ (2009: 544) approach, synthesizing Strathern’s (1988: 131) ideas about the

biographies of people and Gell’s (1998: 17–18) concept of relational agency. A person’s

biography is the sum of their social relationships. The biography of an object can be

similarly viewed as the entirety of its social relationships. The object biography of native

copper offered here broadly follows a chronological narrative but moves in a non-linear

fashion between different contexts to reveal the aggregate of possible social relationships

native copper could acquire during its life. Third, archaeologists working in the north have

long used ethnography and oral history to interpret archaeological data and inform on

past social processes (see discussions in Arundale et al. 1989; Frink and Harry 2008). I

combine aspects of northern Athabascan ontology and technology derived from

ethnography and ethnohistory, including native copper oral history, with archaeology

and materials science data to construct a relational biography(ies) for native copper.

Following Kopytoff (1986: 66), I will examine the ‘biographical possibilities’ of native

copper and how those possibilities were achieved. Who made and used copper artifacts?

Were there recognized stages, or an ‘ideal career’, for the life of a native copper artifact?

Additionally, what is the origin of this technology and what was its relationship to prestige

and rank?

Birth

I begin this biographical perspective on native copper with an overview of the origin of this

technology. Native copper was being used by northern Athabascans before AD 1000, but

most well-dated contexts fall between AD 1000 and the arrival of Europeans in the mid-

eighteenth century (Cooper forthcoming). Geological native copper has been reported at

forty-six discrete locations in south-central Alaska and southwestern Yukon (Cooper et al.

2008). Most sources are found within the traditional territories of the Ahtna, Tutchone,

Dena’ina and Chugach as reflected in the use of place names incorporating indigenous

terms for copper (Fig. 1 and Table 1). Twenty-two such names are known for the region;

twenty are Athabascan and thirteen of those are from the southern Ahtna region, home to

speakers of the Lower Ahtna dialect (Kari 1986, 1990, 2005, 2008; Kari and Fall 2003;

Orth 1967: 530). The Tlingit name for the White River in Tutchone territory means

‘copper river’ (Glave 1892). Two copper place names in Prince William Sound are

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Table

1Copper

place

names

inAlaskaandYukon

No.

Place

names

Translation

Culturalaffiliation

Reference

1TsediNa

copper

river

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

2TsediCae’e

copper

mouth

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

3TsediTu’

copper

water

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

4TsediTs’ese’

Na’

copper

stonecreek

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

5TsediTs’ese’

Cae’e

copper

stonemouth

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

6TsediTs’ese

copper

stone

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

7TsediTs’ese’

Tates

copper

stonepass

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

8TsediTl’aa

copper

headwaters

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

9TsediNa’Ngge’

copper

river

uplands(entire

drainage,

notonmap)

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

10

TsediNa’Luu’(Łuu)

copper

river

uplands(C

hitinaGlacier)

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

11

TsediGgalaaye’

copper

mountain

(locationuncertain,notonmap)

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

12

TsediKulaenden

wherecopper

exists

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

13

TsediKulaen

Na’

wherecopper

exists

creek

Ahtna

Kari(2008)

14

Tsetsaan’Na’

copper

river

(Chisana)

Upper

Tanana

Kari(2008)

?Tsetsaan’Na’Tates

copper

river

pass

Upper

Tanana

Kari(2008)

16

Tsetsaan’Na’Luu’

copper

river

glacier

Upper

Tanana

Kari(2008)

17

Klet-san-dek

(Tsetsaan-digh)

copper

creek

Upper

Tanana/Tutchone

Orth(1967)

18

Eark-heene-nee

copper

river

Tutchone/Tlingit

Glave(1892)

19

TsediBak’ilani

theonein

whichthereiscopper

Dena’ina

KariandFall(2003)

20

TsediBak’ilanitnu

creekin

whichthereiscopper

Dena’ina

KariandFall(2003)

21

Kanawalek

copper

place

Chugach

Birket-Smith(1953)

22

Kanuwalem

Kuiya

creekofonethathascopper

Chugach

Bright(2004)

Native copper in Northwest North America 257

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Chugach (Birket-Smith 1953; Bright 2004). Tsedi, literally ‘that which is hammered’, was

the term used for copper in the Central, Lower and Western Ahtna dialects and by the

Dena’ina. Among the Mentasta Ahtna and other northern Athapaskans the term

tsetsaan’, ‘rock excrement’ was used (Kari 1990: 375; Kari and Fall 2003). Northern

Athabascan groups in the Northwest Territories referred to copper as sa-tson, ‘bear

smoke’ or tsa-intsanne, ‘beaver dung’. Petitot (2005 [1893]: 96) claimed this was because

the dung of these animals is red but referring to rounded globular copper nuggets as dung

may be due to their similarity in form.

Oral history accounts of native copper inform on both its agency and animacy. A

Yakutat Bay narrative describes the discovery of copper by a young Ahtna Athabascan

man prior to the migration of the Ahtna Kwackwan lineage from the confluence of the

Copper and Chitina Rivers to the coast where they were integrated into northern Tlingit

society. A female slave had a son and, being poor and of low status, they were disrespected

in their village and chose to leave and live in the mountains. Four years later the boy had

grown into a young man. One night he was visited in his sleep by a spirit that told him

‘Pass one mountain more. Stay up there.’ The young man went sheep hunting the next day

where the spirit had told him to go. That night the spirit came to him again saying, ‘If you

see four blue flames on the fire, that’s me.’ Four days later while hunting moose he saw

four blue flames in his campfire but was afraid. The next morning the young man found

four fist-sized pieces of copper in the ashes where the four blue flames had been. He did not

know what they were but used part of one to make an arrowhead, which he then used to

kill a moose. After revealing this gift to his mother they returned to their former village.

When the chief saw the copper he became excited and wanted to know where they had

found it but the mother demanded he first recognize them as ‘brave’ (de Laguna 1972:

899–900).

Another copper origin story concerning the Ahtna told by Jim McKinley credits the

discovery of copper, and subsequent Ahtna wealth, to a boy whose uncle did not like him

and sent him away from his village. While ostracized the boy heard singing coming from

the ground and in digging down to find the source of the singing found a big piece of

copper (Kari and Tuttle forthcoming). Another story told by McKinley concerns an old

Ahtna village site on the east bank of the Copper River, Tsedi Kulaende, ‘where copper

exists’. This village was so-named because sometime after the initial discovery of copper

someone floating downriver saw light reflecting off a large piece of copper sticking out of

the river bank. After an attempt to pull the large nugget out of the riverbank using ropes it

fell into the water and could not be recovered but the nearby village was renamed as a

result (Kari 2010; Kari and Tuttle forthcoming).

In a Dena’ina story a man named Tcu-Kun killed his wife because she was unfaithful

and afterward lived alone in the woods but continued to commit murder. He found metal,

presumably copper, in a creek and made several tools including an ax, spear and knife.

After living alone for forty years Tcu-kun approached a young boy of ‘poor class’ saying,

‘Don’t cry little boy, I won’t hurt you. I want you to kill me, I’m tired and old.’ Tcu-kun

piled up his metal and offered it to the boy as payment for killing him. The boy did as

instructed and after killing Tcu-kun went to the house of the chief and told of his killing of

the notorious Tcu-kun. The chief took a metal knife and ax for himself, allowed the boy to

have the rest and married the boy to his daughter (Osgood 1966: 188–9).

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Another Dena’ina story about the discovery of copper told by Shem Pete relates to a

specific location, Tsedi Bak’ilani:

way before the Russians came they found a big [piece of] copper walking around. It

looked like a big porcupine. He [the man who found the copper] peed on that copper

walking around. They found the [that?] maybe four hundred or five hundred years ago,

before the Russians came to Alaska. A rich man’s cousin hunted around Dghelishla. He

saw that copper kinda walk around, come alive, I don’t know. It gave him luck. That’s

where that chief got lucky. That porcupine copper died. He got lucky. They cut a little

piece and make arrow point. They got rich outa that copper. They sell that.

(Kari and Fall 2003: 111; italic text added by author)

I have suggested autochthonous development as the most likely explanation for the

presence of native copper technology in the region based on the abundance of native

copper, oral history emphasizing its local origin and the reasonable expectation that

northern Athabascans were capable of noticing native copper and learning how to work it

(Cooper forthcoming).

Life

Procurement Native copper nuggets range in size from a few millimeters to a few tons.

Indigenous people in Alaska and Yukon used 3–4 gram nuggets obtained from streams.

Sometimes caribou or moose antler was used to rake through gravel looking for nuggets

(Brooks 1900; Schwatka 1996 [1892]). Many native copper sources are at high elevation

with steep slopes. Temporary campsites established in this active erosional environment

are unlikely to survive due to the movement of large amounts of water and sediment

during spring runoff. The Ahtna sometimes coordinated the collection of copper with

hunting sheep, also found at higher elevations, but copper was worked at winter village

sites (Reckord 1983: 82). Copper place names are most abundant in the traditional

territory of the Ahtna, who monopolized its trade (Grinev 1993; Shinkwin 1979). These

place names facilitated the transmission of geographical knowledge of native copper over

time (Kari 1996, 2011), but could also be interpreted as making claims of ownership on

copper (Vine de Loria 1981 in Basso 1996: 156). de Laguna and McClellan (1981: 645)

stated that, among the Ahtna, copper ‘demanded religious precautions to secure the

nuggets, and specialized knowledge to shape it into knives, daggers, spear heads, and

harpoon heads’. Like the spirits of animals copper was aware of human action and intent

and could be offended, with negative consequences (Boraas and Peter 2008; de Laguna

1969; Nelson 1983).

Trade and exchange A native copper provenance study demonstrated the possibility of

differentiating between some sources in the region on the basis of trace elements, but too

few sources have been sampled at present to source artifacts confidently (Cooper et al.

2008). According to ethnohistoric accounts (Grinev 1993; Reckord 1983; Shinkwin 1979)

the Ahtna controlled the movement of native copper to the coast in Alaska. The Udzisyu,

a Lower Ahtna lineage, may have had the most influence on this trade as they lived in the

Native copper in Northwest North America 259

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southern portion of Ahtna territory where native copper sources are concentrated, and

were closer to coastal trading partners than other Ahtna (McClellan 1971: 231).

An Ahtna story that demonstrates both the high value afforded to copper and its ability

to act as an agent of social change focuses on Cuuy (literally ‘least weasel’ – Kari 1990;

Kari and Tuttle forthcoming). Cuuy was a chief of small physical stature, approximately

2½ feet tall (dwarf or midget), who lived near the Gulkana site. Cuuy was not well-liked,

presumably due to his size and having been born to a woman of low status. He attached

himself to different wealthy chiefs living around the confluence of the Copper and Chitina

Rivers and from them learned how to work copper, an activity at which he excelled. After

making fifty arrowheads of copper he took them inland to trade with the Tanana people.

This was the first time they saw copper. He was so successful in trading he had to acquire

slaves from among the Tanana to help him carry back his furs (Kari and Tuttle

forthcoming; Reckord 1983: 53). Cuuy became a chief with sixty followers and lived in a

big house held together with the aid of copper nails (Gibson and Mischler 1984: 23).

A story about copper that involves the Kwackwan migration from Ahtna territory to

Yakutat Bay was collected by Swanton (1909: 347–68) from the Tlingit. After travelling to

the coast and living there several years a man sent six of his nephews along the shore in a

canoe to look for people. They found people living in Yakutat Bay but those people sent

the newcomers away. The brothers returned to their uncle who then sent them on another

trip, this time back to their homeland in the interior to retrieve a large piece of copper

(referred to as a ‘plate’), possibly a large nugget (Keithahn 1964). The brothers found the

copper, which was ‘very long’ with ‘eyes and hands’, and cut it down the middle before

carrying it back to the coast. The Kwackwan gave the copper, whose value was said to be

worth ten slaves, to the Yakutat people who accepted it as payment for a salmon stream.

Manufacture Cold-hammering native copper compresses individual metal grains

resulting in a microstructure with multiple linear striations (Fig. 2). Heating cold-worked

copper at a temperature of around 3008C for a few minutes causes the nucleation and

growth of a new set of equiaxed strain-free grains (Fig. 3). This re-crystallization restores

malleability. The microstructure of worked and annealed copper shows equiaxed grains

and annealing twins. Twins are a result of the growth of new crystals during annealing

which creates a mirrored plane within the crystal and appears microscopically as parallel

straight lines. Though twins may be present in geological specimens of native copper due

to re-crystallization caused by strain associated with geological events, they are much more

numerous in samples of native copper that have been worked and annealed (Wayman

1989). Metallographic examination of native copper artifacts from the Gulkana site

(GUL-077) (Cooper 2007: 122–4; Franklin et al. 1981) and oral history (Kari and Fall

2003; McClellan 1975; McKennan 1959; Osgood 1966; Rainey 1939) corroborates the

hammering and annealing of native copper in Alaska-Yukon, which was the basic

technique used in North America (Leader 1988) and Eurasia (Craddock 1995; Stech 1999).

The chaıne operatoire involved beating nuggets into sheets which were then folded to

build up bulk. Small pieces were removed during manufacture but instead of fracturing

when subjected to force, like lithic, bone or wood, native copper undergoes plastic

deformation (Franklin et al. 1981; Wayman 1989; Workman 1976). Native copper

technology blends aspects of lithic technology and metallurgy. The Ahtna and Dena’ina

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term for native copper, tsedi, ‘that which is hammered’, refers specifically to how this

material was worked. Those especially skilled at working copper were known among the

Ahtna as c’etseden, ‘one who hammers’ (Kari 1990: 375) and among the Dena’ina as

nuk’qetset, ‘they pound it’ (Kari and Fall 2003: 111).

The archaeological distribution of native copper in Alaska and Yukon suggests supply

zone behavior (Renfrew 1977), whereby native copper was obtained either directly from a

source or in trade from someone with direct access. The most numerous native copper

artifacts in Alaska and Yukon are small pieces of scrap, usually thin sheets, left over from

the manufacturing process. Seventy-one such artifacts were recovered from the Gulkana

site (GUL-077) (Hanson 2008; Workman 1976) and 106 from Dakah De’nin’s Village

(VAL-065) (Shinkwin 1979), demonstrating that these two sites were important copper-

working centers. Dakah De’nin’s Village is near the confluence of the Chitina and Copper

Rivers, which became the focal point of native copper knowledge and expertise (Reckord

1983) probably during the Late Prehistoric period. The biographies of copper artifacts

would be similar during the manufacturing stage because they had not yet acquired their

unique histories (Appadurai 1986: 42; Schiffer 1972). Their life histories would be

temporarily fixed during manufacture into various specific forms but native copper’s

potential to be re-worked through annealing means it could begin life anew in a different

form, which may have contributed to its animacy.

Figure 2 Metallograph of experimentally worked native copper showing typical cold-workedmicrostructure.

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Use-life A total of 569 native copper artifacts have been recovered from seventy-seven

sites in Alaska and Yukon. Most sites have only one or a few specimens, but four sites

(Fig. 1) have many, accounting for over half of all the artifacts. In Athabascan

archaeological contexts native copper occurs primarily as tools; its use as prestige

technology was limited. However, regional oral history emphasizes a connection between

native copper, wealth, prestige and ranking (Cooper 2006). Native copper continued to be

used into the early part of the twentieth century even after imported metal trade goods

were available (Cooper forthcoming).

The most common native copper artifacts after scrap are awls (and various awl-like

objects probably used as needles, drills and punches). Awls of various materials, most

likely bone and copper, were part of the toolkits of both men and women (McKennan

1959: 68). The Ahtna manufactured snowshoes using awls, lacing needles and drills all

made of copper (Kari 1990: 375). The next most common copper tools found

archaeologically and also attested to in oral history are spear and arrow points and

knives. One form of knife made from copper has been referred to as an ulu, an Eskimo

term for a knife with one straight edge for hafting and one semi-lunar edge. These knives

are also referred to as a ‘woman’s knife’ due to their association with women’s work, and

were also used by Athabascans. Copper knives and points were used to kill bears (Upper

Tanana, Ahtna and Tutchone) and people (Ahtna and Tutchone) (Kari 1990: 375;

Figure 3 Metallograph of experimentally worked native copper showing typical worked andannealed microstructure.

262 H. Kory Cooper

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McClellan 1975: 127; Oswalt 1973: 118; Shinkwin 1979: 26). Early in the twentieth century

the Ahtna were reported to use ‘ceremonial knives of copper. . .for cutting the first salmon

caught in the beginning of the season’s run’ (Moffit and Maddren 1909: 19). The First

Salmon ceremony was ubiquitous among northwest Native North Americans dependent

on salmon for subsistence (Gunther 1926). No indication was given that the copper knife

used in the First Salmon ceremony looked different from other fish knives or that it was

highly regarded at other times of the year.

During an episode of warfare between the Upper Tanana and Tutchone in the early

nineteenth century the Upper Tanana used ‘some copper, old copper arrowheads’

(Plate 1), to kill Tutchone. These arrowheads were retrieved from the bodies of the

deceased and hammered back into shape to be used again (Katie John in Kari 1986: 101);

a reworked and reused copper arrowhead had ‘special power’. Taking a human life was a

spiritually dangerous act that required the observance of several ‘life-crisis taboos’ (de

Laguna and McClellan 1981: 652). A copper weapon used to kill a human was spiritually

as well as physically dangerous. Similarly, during his 1891 travels through Yukon and

Alaska Schwatka (1996 [1892]: 129) was told by the Tutchone that if a person were to

strike a copper boulder with an ax or any other tool they will soon die. The quote from de

Laguna and McClellan (1981: 645) regarding the need for ‘precautions’ when obtaining

native copper also supports the idea that copper was potentially dangerous. Athabascan

technology was part of a ‘spiritual interchange’ (Nelson 1983: 232). Like the spirits of

animals, spirits associated with material objects can be offended by disrespectful humans

with the result that they become ineffective or dangerous.

In most situations contact with native copper had positive consequences. In Yakutat

Bay native copper was worn as an amulet for good luck (de Laguna 1972: 664). Among the

Tutchone copper was believed to ‘keep the body pretty good’ and was worn to ensure

good health. A young girl confined as part of her initiation into womanhood might keep

copper pieces in her mouth to ensure strong teeth in old age (McClellan 1975: 256). Only

at the northern Tlingit site of Old Town in Yakutat Bay, partly composed of Kwackwan

(Ahtna) emigrants, is there significant archaeological evidence of the use of native copper

as prestige technology. Out of a total of forty-eight copper artifacts from the site sixteen

are bracelets, beads or rings. While working there de Laguna was told that copper was

worn only by the ‘rich and noble’ (1972: 445).

Death Native copper artifacts in Alaska and Yukon, even those specimens that could be

considered prestige technology, are not associated with human burials or other obvious

ritual contexts. Native copper is associated with campsite hearths at Gulkana (GUL-077),

midden at Dixthada (TNX-004) and semi-subterranean house pits at Dakah De’nin’s

Village (VAL-065) and Old Town (YAK-007). In some cases native copper artifacts may

represent objects lost and forgotten. Regardless, the first three sites mentioned above are

notable exceptions to the generalization that northern Athabascan archaeological sites are

lacking in artifacts.

A number of explanations have been offered for this phenomenon including the de-

emphasis on technological materiality discussed earlier. An additional factor could be the

combined effect of dependence on organic materials and their unlikely preservation in the

Subarctic environment (Ives 1990). More recently, Boraas and Peter (2008: 215–21) have

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discussed the importance of the concepts of beggesh and beggesha in explaining the

dearth of artifacts at large late prehistoric Dena’ina village sites identified by the

presence of house and storage pits. Beggesh is the ‘negative or impure’ ‘trace’ or ‘scent’

that may become associated with objects or places; beggesha is the opposite, i.e. indicates

a state of purity. Beggesh can be sensed by animals, spirits and other Dena’ina. The

negative consequences resulting from the detection of beggesh by spirits dictated that

things such as animal bones be disposed of in bodies of water or burned. Similar beliefs

among the Ahtna (de Laguna and McClellan 1981: 658–9) and Tutchone (McClellan

1975: 348) regarding the dangerous and potentially contaminating power of the body

and spirit of a deceased individual encouraged the abandonment of the deceased’s house

as a method for avoiding lingering spirits. The degree to which any of these practices

may account for how and why a native copper artifact’s life came to an end is unclear.

Northern Athabascan rules governing proper disposal of material culture were

complicated and varied. Archaeological evidence of animacy among northern

Athabascans may be difficult to see, but an interpretation of the archaeological record

informed by indigenous ontology derived from ethnography, ethnohistory and linguistics

provides valuable insight into both the animacy and agency of northern Athabascan

technology, especially native copper.

Plate 1 Copper projectile point (University of Alaska Museum of the North Archaeology, UA73-020-0605).

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Summary

By applying a relational object biography approach (Joy 2009) to native copper I have

attempted to capture its sum total of social relationships and multiple biographical

possibilities in indigenous society in Alaska and Yukon. The value and meaning of copper

in Alaska and Yukon was in flux during its life depending on the context of use. One of the

more dramatic changes in the life history of native copper was its movement from practical

technology among northern Athabascans of the interior to prestige technology among the

Yakutat Tlingit on the coast, but this dichotomy fails to capture its qualities of animacy

and agency. It had eyes and hands, it walked around in the form of a porcupine, it was

aware of human behavior, chose to whom it would reveal itself and provided a way to

elevate one’s status. Copper was used for the spiritually dangerous activities of killing

humans and hunting bears and itself grew in spiritual power as a result of this interaction.

Not only was native copper an emblem of rank among the Yakutat Tlingit but as a form

of wealth it acted as an agent for elevating one’s rank. Just as the status of lower-ranking

people was raised via their association with native copper, copper’s status changed when

moving across space from interior to coast. Finally, native copper was not discovered by

people as a result of scientific experimentation but instead revealed itself to people.

Acknowledgments

This paper was based in part on research conducted in the course of my PhD studies in the

Department of Anthropology at the University of Alberta, and was additionally funded by

the Canadian Circumpolar Institute. I wish to thank Peter Topping, Francois Giligny and

Gabriel Cooney for providing the opportunity to present an earlier version of this paper in

the session ‘From Tools to Tombs: the Creation of Identities in Stone’ at the 2008 World

Archaeological Congress in Dublin. I would also like to thank Melanie Giles and James

Kari for their valuable comments on this paper and James Kari and Siri Tuttle for access

to unpublished material. Any errors are, of course, my own.

Purdue University

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H. Kory Cooper is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Purdue

University in West Lafayette, Indiana, where he also holds a courtesy appointment in the

School of Materials Engineering. His research combines archeology, archeometallurgy

and ethnohistory to investigate native copper innovation among diverse hunter-gatherers

in the Arctic, Subarctic and Northwest Coast culture areas.

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