0021 Copper catches Carol Hill’s eye.  She is a geologist.  She knows that, once the trick of cooking copper ore and getting copper metal is discovered, then it should spread on the wings of mimicry.  Do we have a potential date for the discovery?  How about 7250 years ago?  This is 550 years after the Ubaid begins and 1250 years before the start of the Uruk period.

0022 Hill mentions Otzi the Iceman.  5250 years ago, Otzi lives in the mountainous region between Italy and Austria.  He falls to his death while crossing a glacier.

Lucky for us, I suppose.  Modern archaeologists recover his body, well preserved by the ice, along with all his traveling gear, including a copper axe.

0023 What does this suggest?

In 2000 years, the recipe for transforming copper ore into metal passes from southwest Asia through northern Italy.

By current standards, this is a slow transmission of cultural information.

By the standards of the Paleolithic, this is a rapid transmission.

0024 The key is the one-wayness of the transmission.  Once those who have the recipe make copper metal, there is no going back.  The cultural change is irreversible.

Otzi has a copper axe.  His great-great-…-great grandson will have one made of bronze.