The copper of Lake Superior

Native copper is copper occurring in pure form in nature, which can be cold-hammered into tools without being smelted from ore. The Old Copper Complex is interesting precisely because it did not lead to a Bronze Age. After millennia the use declined, and copper was thereafter mostly worked into ornaments and grave goods. The likely explanation is that hammered copper is no better than good flint for most purposes, and the gain arrives only with alloying and casting. It is a useful corrective to the idea that technological development has one direction.