Stone axes vs. copper-headed axes

[svensson]

A bushcrafter named Shawn Woods has done several videos about recreating the gear of Ötzi the Iceman. For much, but not all, of his work he uses 5000 year old techniques and he is absolutely clear on where he makes mistakes, where he makes an educated guess, and where he changes the basic pattern to fit his 'criminal left-handedness' [to quote Ian 'Gun Jesus' McCollum].

In this video, he compares a European stone axe pattern to Ötzi's copper-headed axe. I thought some of you might be interested.

 

 

Edited December 20, 2023 by Nick Brooke
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[Agentorange]

Interesting - especially when you consider in Glorantha  there's a variety of Enchant ( metal ) rituals to allow your copper ( or whatever ! ) axe to have the strength and durability of bronze.

[Akhôrahil]

3 minutes ago, Agentorange said:

Interesting - especially when you consider in Glorantha  there's a variety of Enchant ( metal ) rituals to allow your copper ( or whatever ! ) axe to have the strength and durability of bronze.

Better, even, for copper.

Enchant Stone would be super useful for some cultures!

Edited December 21, 2023 by Akhôrahil

[svensson]

On 12/21/2023 at 12:19 PM, Akhôrahil said:

Better, even, for copper.

Enchant Stone would be super useful for some cultures!

I should think the Balazarings would a get a LOT of mileage out of that one.

[Darius West]

On 12/22/2023 at 7:19 AM, Akhôrahil said:

Better, even, for copper.

Enchant Stone would be super useful for some cultures!

I totally agree.  Actually you can get flint/obsidian/ natural glass heads to 1 micron edges, which you can't do with metals.  If it was possible to enchant such material to increase its durability, natural glass could potentially outperform the metals as edged weapons. Even better, anyone can potentially use stone tools without penalty, so you could have everyone spending 1 POW to have a reusable super-sharp flint spear at their disposal.

[Akhôrahil]

5 hours ago, Darius West said:

I totally agree.  Actually you can get flint/obsidian/ natural glass heads to 1 micron edges, which you can't do with metals. 

There was a practical experiment to reproduce Egyptian mummification, and their conclusion was that when it comes to working with skin, bronze sucks and obsidian rules. Even today, when you want a super fine edge in an experiment, crackin* glass in certain ways is very useful.

[Darius West]

23 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

There was a practical experiment to reproduce Egyptian mummification, and their conclusion was that when it comes to working with skin, bronze sucks and obsidian rules. Even today, when you want a super fine edge in an experiment, crackin* glass in certain ways is very useful.

Again, agreed.  I heard apparently MIT (afaik) created a machine that drops glass coke bottles to shatter and produce a single micron edge that lands in a painted circle nearby every time.  They are used as scalpels for microsurgery.

[svensson]

On 12/24/2023 at 2:30 AM, Darius West said:

Again, agreed.  I heard apparently MIT (afaik) created a machine that drops glass coke bottles to shatter and produce a single micron edge that lands in a painted circle nearby every time.  They are used as scalpels for microsurgery.

We discussed this in a discussion of RQG hunting and weapons therefore.

There are neurosurgeons who insist on igneous glass scalpels because they're the only instrument with a fine enough edge to slice a nerve lengthwise. I met one once from the University of Washington School of Medicine and that's where I learned about that.