The Metalsmiths (Time-Life Emergence of Man).pdf

Time-Life | 1974 | Pdf | Eng | ISBN10 0705400581 | 160 pag | 32.3 MB

One of the earliest specialists to step out of the shadows of prehistory is the metalsmith, a man who, even from the beginning, held a curious place in the social order. Sometimes he was held in high regard, sometimes in low—and for obvious reasons. Though he worked hard, his person was dirty; his face was blackened and his clothes burned by the smoke and heat of the fire. On the other hand, the things he made were useful and beautiful, and he had, in addition, the apparently godlike ability to alter the very nature of matter. He could turn dull rock into gleaming metal and could, at will, make his material liquid or solid, rigid or flexible. In very ancient times such changes were regarded as expressions of forces, not infrequently spiritual, within the material itself.