[meteorite-list] The tale of a falling star

Wed Jun 10 00:57:09 EDT 2009

Doug said:
> I am thinking [of] Greece, Cyprus and Turkey, but no meteorite comes 
> to mind.

I'm sure Doug named those places because
there were famous meteorites of religious
significance associated with sites there. While
it is true that their whereabouts is presently
unknown [and will likely remain that way), there's
no doubt whatsoever about their existence.

So, no, no ancient ruins "yielded" authenticated
meteorites. You see, there was this obscure
religious cult that took over and tried, with great
success, to destroy all traces of any previous
religious worship, temples, shrines, relics, and
so forth.

No meteorite survivors of Greece and Rome are
known.

However, there are pieces of the "Black Stone" of
the Kaa'ba, a meteorite, in Turkey (by a List memeber):
http://kauscience.k12.hi.us/~ted/Blackstone/hajar-al-aswad.htm

The meteoritic nature (or non-nature) of a famous
Temple stone is discussed by another List member:
http://imca.repetti.net/articles/IMCA-Insights4.htm

Evidence in coinage of Temple stones, some of which
were meteorites, can be found here (more List members):
http://www.pibburns.com/catastro/metstamp.htm#classicalcoins

A discussion of various meteoritic Temple stones can be
found here (Popular ASstronomy, 1936, at ADS):
http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu//full/1936PA.....44..514W/0000514.000.html

Traditionally, the Classical Temple stones were
"nose-cone" shaped. In a word, oriented (if they were
meteorites). There is a fascinating discussion of why
the baetyls that are found are not actually meteorites.
The explanation? Lots of shrines, but not so many
meteorites!
http://www.ancients.info/forums/showthread.php?t=845

Everybody wants a meteorite for their Temple, ya know?

Sterling K. Webb
--------------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mexicodoug" <mexicodoug at aim.com>
To: <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2009 10:40 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] The tale of a falling star

> Great article, though this paragraph about other "meteors" being found 
> need editing:
>
> "Other meteors have been located in ancient ruins of the Americas, as
> well as around the world, ranging in size from the three ounce
> Pojoaque meteorite, found in an ancient pottery bowl near Santa Fe,
> N.M., to the 3,407-pound Casas Grandes iron discovered in an Inca ruin
> near Chihuahua, Mexico."
>
> The Incas, of course are not from Chihuahua, but a good fraction of a 
> world away in Peru ... The author is referring to the Paquimé pueblo 
> of the probably Anasazi Pueblo type Indians (Like from the US 
> southwest), though they may have had a tad more of Aztec influence. 
> And the meteorite is from INSIDE Chihuahua (the state), and NEAR 
> Nuevas Casas Grandes. It was found far from Chihuahua City actually 
> much closer to Arizona which is just 93 miles away. Political 
> boundaries...bah :-)
>
> Does anyone recall what other ancient ruins yielded authenticated 
> meteorites outside the Americas as claiming by the article they are 
> found "all around the world in ancient ruins". I am thinking Greece, 
> Cyprus and Turkey, but no meteorite comes to mind. And the Japanese 
> one was certainly not found in ruins.
>
> Another tear shed today after reading about the other Grand Canyon 
> fragment...
>
> "In 1953, after America abandoned Route 66, Nininger moved his
> collection to Sedona, where it was put on display in the Verde Valley
> for the first time in nearly 800 yea
> rs."
>
> One (at least me) wonders whether the "800 year buried piece of Canyon 
> Diablo (Camp Verde piece)" was ever at all "on display" on the Native 
> American Sinagua or if it was placed to rest with that stone 
> ceremonially out of sight with respects being rendered specifically 
> NOT to be displayed, I am not sure how this statement about displaying 
> could be made in the article with any accuracy, and suppose the author 
> really got carried away trying to say the Camp Verde piece is on 
> display in the Verde Vally of AZ...but not sure; thanks for the post!
>
> Best wishes,
> Doug
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael Groetz <mpg4444 at gmail.com>
> To: Meteorite List <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Tue, 9 Jun 2009 8:37 pm
> Subject: [meteorite-list] The tale of a falling star
>
>
>
> http://verdenews.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&subsectionID=1&articleID=31230
>
> The tale of a falling star
> By Steve Ayers, Staff Reporter
>
> Tuesday, June 09, 2009
>
> CAMP VERDE - George Dawson was no stranger to hard work.
>
> A seasoned construction hand, he traveled extensively throughout
> Central America and the American southwest, moving mountains for money
> and, when time allowed, doing some digging on his own for both fun and
> profit.
>
> In the spring of 1927, Dawson found himself between jobs. A Phoenix
> resident, he loaded his truck with supplies and tools of his trade,
> and headed north, hoping the fertile ground of the Verde Valley would
> surren
> der its ancient treasures.
>
> Pothunters like Dawson knew the valley to be a steady source of income
> for anyone willing to turn over a few stones.
>
> For this trip he chose a uniquely constructed ruin located on a
> windswept, five-acre mesa above West Clear Creek.
>
> With a view of the entire valley, the outline of its crumbled walls
> looked more like a stockade than a home, a nearly square perimeter of
> rooms surrounding a common courtyard.
>
> Latter-day archaeologists believe the pueblo was built by people of
> the Salado culture, indigenous to the Salt River Valley, instead of
> the native Sinagua whose former homes make up the bulk of the Verde's
> ancient architecture.
>
> A very good day
>
> One day while searching through rubble in the northeast corner of one
> room, Dawson spied a familiar structure -- one that led him to believe
> it was going to be a good day -- a very good day.
>
> The flat slab of sandstone at his feet, he knew to be the cover of a
> burial cyst, just the right size to contain the body of a child, along
> with whatever treasures the family had packed along for the afterlife.
>
> Dawson slid the cover back and began clearing the accumulated dirt and
> debris. Eighteen inches down he uncovered a layer of feathers. As he
> gently scraped away he realized in was a blanket of feathers, wrapped
> about the cherished treasure.
>
> An hour or so later, having cleared out all but the feather blanket
> and its contents, he reached20in and gently lifted the bundle.
>
> It pulled back.
>
> A second more forceful tug and Dawson realized it was not the
> lightweight body of the child he had expected.
>
> With great difficulty, he wrestled the object from its grave, pulled
> back the delicate feather blanket and found himself gazing at a
> two-foot long, one-foot wide, five-inch thick, 135-pound, oddly-shaped
> hunk of rusting rock.
>
> Dawson had an idea of what he was looking at, but it was not until
> several months later, after it was tested, that he knew for sure. The
> object so delicately wrapped and reverently placed in the stone cyst
> was a nickel-iron meteorite, or what meteorite collectors call simply,
> an iron.
>
> The second journey
>
> To date, know one knows how it got there.
>
> We do know that Dawson sold it in 1939 to one of the preeminent
> meteorite researchers and collectors of his day, Harold Harlow
> Nininger, who dubbed it the Camp Verde Meteorite. Convention dictated
> it be named for the closest post office or geological feature.
>
> We also know that in 1959 Nininger sold the meteorite, along with more
> than 700 others, to Arizona State University, where it is currently
> housed in the school's meteorite collection at ASU's Center for
> Meteorite Studies.
>
> What significance the object held to the architecturally unique souls
> who once lived on Wingfield Mesa, we will likely never know.
> Archaeologists have uncovered feather blankets, and several
> meteorites, in archaeological digs.
> Dawson is the only one to have
> found both of them together.
>
> Religious significance
>
> A year after Dawson's find, two pothunters discovered another
> meteorite in a stone cyst, or at least 40 to 50 pounds of fragments
> thereof, in a ruin east of Flagstaff. It became known as the Winona
> Meteorite and is now on display at the museum of Northern Arizona.
>
> Other meteors have been located in ancient ruins of the Americas, as
> well as around the world, ranging in size from the three ounce
> Pojoaque meteorite, found in an ancient pottery bowl near Santa Fe,
> N.M., to the 3,407-pound Casas Grandes iron discovered in an Inca ruin
> near Chihuahua, Mexico.
>
> As Peter Pilles, archaeologist for the Coconino National Forest, has
> observed, when archaeologists are uncertain about an object's use or
> importance, they give it religious significance.
>
> But in the case of the Camp Verde meteorite, with its feather
> wrappings and the fact it was stored in the same manner as human
> remains, there can be little doubt it was held in reverence.
>
> Scientific questions
>
> Lawrence Garvie, director of meteorite collection at ASU, is a
> scientist both by nature and by training. But even he can't help but
> speculate on the meteorite's unusual shape and significance.
>
> "It looks to me more like a child than a leaf or an arrowhead, as some
> have described it. It has a distinctive head and shoulders, and a very
> pronounced backbone that appears to have been rubbed smooth by human
> touch. And when struck it has a beautiful ringing sound," Garvie says.
>
> For scientists like Garvie, and the Center for Meteorites Studies
> founder and former director, Carleton Moore, the meteorite also poses
> some real world questions, not the least of which is where did it fall
> and how did it end up in the ruins of an ancient pueblo.
>
> About 50,000 years ago, a 150-foot diameter, 300,000-ton, iron and
> nickel meteorite crashed into Canyon Diablo outside of modern-day
> Winslow, creating Meteor Crater. The impact vaporized at least half
> and scattered the remaining pieces across a wide area of the Colorado
> Plateau.
>
> "The interesting thing about Camp Verde is that it does not look like
> the other Canyon Diablo irons," Moore says. "Its chemistry, however,
> is identical. So the only conclusion we can make is that it is a piece
> of Canyon Diablo.
>
> "But I have always had my doubts. The other great puzzle is also how
> did it get so far from Meteor Crater. The nomadic people who lived in
> Arizona didn't lug these sorts of things around."
>
> Garvie and Moore both believe it is possible the Camp Verde meteorite
> was a fragment that separated from the main mass of the Canyon Diablo
> meteorite as it broke apart in the atmosphere, landing farther south.
>
> Fact or fiction
>
> As for the fate of the feather blanket, it was parceled out and lost.
> According to a correspondence from Dawson to Nininger, he (Dawson)
> gave away pieces of the blanket=2
> 0to collectors over the years.
>
> It would seem possible that the entire story of the Camp Verde
> meteorite is pure fiction, dreamt up by Dawson to make an otherwise
> common iron meteorite more valuable, were it not for statements in a
> narrative Nininger later wrote.
>
> Nininger notes he never heard the story of the meteorite's discovery
> until he came to Phoenix to make the purchase. There is also the fact
> that he bought it for what he described as no more than "the price
> usually paid for Canyon Diablo irons ($0.50 per pound)."
>
> Lastly, in April 1940, at Nininger's request, Dawson brought him to
> Camp Verde to see the pueblo and search for feathers or the remains of
> the cyst.
>
> "We hunted the long line of obscure ruins until he reached the
> crumbled walls of a small room, in the corner of which was a slight
> depression and several flat stones protruding from the drifted dust
> and debris.
>
> "Digging out the filling of dust and weeds failed to reveal a shred of
> the feather cloth wrapping, but this was hardly surprising...We
> gathered the flat stones and made several trips down the steep slope
> to the car and back again," Nininger states.
>
> Final journey
>
> The ancient owners of the Camp Verde meteorite may or may not have
> lugged it around in their travels, but Nininger did. For seven years
> following its purchase, he continued to search the planet for what had
> fallen from the heavens.
>
> Then in 1946, he quit the road and esta
> blished the American Meteorite
> Museum on Route 66 near Meteor Crater, where it went on public
> display.
>
> In 1953, after America abandoned Route 66, Nininger moved his
> collection to Sedona, where it was put on display in the Verde Valley
> for the first time in nearly 800 years.
>
> Today the Camp Verde meteorite rests prominently on a table with two
> dozen other irons, many of which came with the Nininger collection, in
> the center of a room containing hundreds of other meteorites from
> across the world and, ultimately, beyond.
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