Native American tool (probably solved)

[SilverFinger]

I found this piece about 2 weeks ago buried deeply (10-12" or so) in an old church ground near Manitowoc Wisconsin. I thought it was interesting. I sent pictures to Great Lakes Copper Research and it was (probably) identified as Indian (Chippewa) 16th century. The iron 'nails' through it held an iron handle which has deteriorated and disappeared over the years, leaving just the copper head of the item. He said it's probably from 'float copper' (whatever that is). I'm sending it to them to make a positive ID and get a COA. Thanks to those here who set me straight that it wasn't all iron! Good call!

It's funny how you can go out one day and find 14 cents worth of zinc pennies and go out another and find stuff like this!

If anyone's interested, there are bigger pictures here:
http://www.mbinserts.com/metdet

 

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[ryaan21]

Looks to me like a crude skinning/brisket breaker. The iron piece would have been used to curl the fingers around. I could be wrong,but its fun to speculate. Ignore the crudeness of my image. Art was never my strong point.

 

[desertmoons]

Hmmmm

if it is float copper it likely came from those old copper mines in Michigan,. But if it had iron nails in it..well i am not sure they used iron! Those straight lines markings remind me of French Trade Ax markings.

The site here lists lots of them. Though the french seemed to trade iron more than copper..i suppose anything is possible! Not sure if the time period is right though.

http://www.lanouvelle-france.com/markings.htm