Monette Bebow-Reinhard

Historian, Copper Artifact Analyst, Novelist, Actor

feb_2020_can-2.pdf (1.2 MB)

My other random February newsletter.

feb_2019_can.pdf (1.87 MB)

COPPER ARTIFACT NEWSLETTER FEBRUARY 2019

Read Past Newsletters

Refer to this photo on bottom of newsletter

APRIL 2020 COPPER NEWSLETTER

Etowah and the 3 phases of its construction, plus connections to Mesoamerica (bi-lob) and Southwest (d-shape) and their input on palisades came after invention of the bow/arrow.

From an Etowah article by … Cobb and King, "Reinventing Mississippian Tradition at Etowah," Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, Vol. 12, No. 3, September 2005 (C 2005) DOI: 10.1007/s10816-005-6927-y

Keyes and Archaeology (A Bill Green article)

There was a key figure in Iowa archaeology – Charles R. Keyes. He was not a trained archaeologist. Here's how he was described: "Keyes commanded national respect for his rapid acquisition of an encyclopedic knowledge of Iowa archaeology, despite having no formal training in American archaeology -- he knew literally everything anyone at the time could know on the subject. His stature arose also from his organizational abilities, reflected by his creation of the Iowa Archaeological Survey." (William Green, CR Keyes & Iowa Archaeology, 81).

Similarly, I'm learning all I can on the fly and, too, am creating also an archaeological survey. I face a lot of criticism in my work, in part, I'm sure, because I have to work with both collectors and museums at a time when there is friction between the two. Collectors once created archaeology. Now they're looked down on. I would enjoy having a role in bringing the two into a kind of symbiotic relationship once again, where trust is the key element.

Keyes devised a detailed research plan and survey of artifacts in Iowa to date in 1922, so I'm sure much of what's been turned up in the CAMD is due to his efforts. If possible I will need to find the Keyes' Collection, which houses 108,000 artifacts, and helped implement preservation of various sites around the state (82).

Green's full article can be found here:

https://scholarworks.uni.edu/jias/vol99/iss4/7/?utm_source=scholarworks.uni.edu%2Fjias%2Fvol99%2Fiss4%2F7&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages

Is there no end to the mysteries of the ancient world? Michael Ruggeri, Chicago Archaeological Society, shared a new discovery at Poverty Point.

https://www.bnd.com/news/nation-world/national/article241821501.html

A response received on his list is interesting:

The fired clay "balls" found at Poverty Point have been a matter of considerable speculation as to their function. One time Jeffry Coe showed me a drawer full of them in the Archaeology Lab at Chapel Hill. What is known about them so far: approximately 20,000 of them have been found; most have been recovered in cooking areas or in deposits of domestic trash; they date to about 1,200 B.C.; not all are balls; some are square; some seem to be wads of clay squeezed between the fingers before firing; some look like Mesoamerican spindle whorls but often the hole does not completely traverse the ball; many are decorated with incised lines. One theory is that they were heated and used for "stone boiling". I know of no counterpart to them in the Formative of Mexico. Surprisingly Mesoamerican-like, however, is the great number of prismatic blades struck from prepared cores that have been recovered at Poverty Point. Also of interest, not too long ago Berle Clay discovered remnants of one or more "woodhenges" at the site.

By Joe Mountjoy, who also wrote the following:

There is nothing better than consulting with an archaeologist who has done a lot of investigations at Poverty Point, so I contacted my friend Berle Clay and this is what he wrote to me about the subject of the small fired clay pieces.

Good to hear from you...yes they are definitely fired...having done much magnetometry at Poverty Point I can attest that ppo fragments are a major source of background magnetics! They are not temporally restricted to Poverty Point culture but occur at later dates. They seem to be restricted to the major alluvial plains (like the Mississippi/Yazoo) where other stone that might be used for cooking is simply not available. However, at major Poverty Point sites they occur in abundance, not so elsewhere. Obviously they are making a statement about food preparation. I know in New Ireland where Brenda and I worked hot rocks were used both for "earth oven" cooking and boiling in surface containers. I have seen someone bring water to boil in about a minute by dropping hot rocks in...removing them...and adding more. At Poverty Point they did get somewhat creative in the forms of ppo they produced...including a range of simple "sculptures" of human and animal forms.

I've often suspected there was some Mesoamerican influence and this dialogue tends to agree with that.

This find in an off-archaeology newsletter struck a chord with me:

"First of all, knowledge is never free. It is the product of years of labor in writing and research. Nobody in this society works for free, nor should authors alone be expected to, particularly since we are one of the few professions Congress is empowered to protect in the Constitution." Scott Turow, "Knowledge is not Free," Authors Guild newsletter, April 2020

I've met people who think I should just give all my research away, make it free to anyone who wants it.

Shame on them. This is research that took a lot of time and energy, and what makes anyone think

should do it for free? If someone can explain this to me, or why there are collectors and/or museums who don't see the value in adding their materials to the database, I'd love to have it explained.

Refer to photo of Michigan Copper found in this source:

In 1862 Charles Whittlesey called this a bodkin. Anyone know what a bodkin is? If you look it up online it's referred to as a needle. I'm not at all sure why this looks like a needle. Any ideas?

April 20, 2022

BITS

Playing the waiting game with another audition. It's like waiting to hear back from publishers. Waiting for my life to start, but I guess that's wrong, isn't it? Volunteering is now my life.

I am an official Belot Art Council Board member! What's funny is that the monthly meetings are at 5:30, when my city committee meetings are the same day at 4 p.m. That sounds like fun. and the first one I'll be going to is on my birthday. Yeah, officially!

Anthropologie - the clothing store - is now off my list forever. It's mostly for kids now anyway, which is why they thought I didn't deserve an apology for making me drive back so they could fix their screw-up. They do have some fun stuff aside from clothing, but who needs it?

"Everything Everywhere All At Once" is an existential philosophy type movie that is constantly moving, a mind blower that asks you to accept that alternate realities are happening everywhere in the universe at the same time. And then land back in the one in which you're most familiar and make it work. It was a delight to see Jamie Lee Curtis as the villanous IRS agent.

PIECES

I would not be surprised that my agency fires me, for the way I keep screwing up. I sent in the two readings for an audition -- now, mind you, I had to work around my husband's eye appointment because he was feeding me lines. But I forgot to slate myself! Yes, that just means to say your name and smile. So the agent (their whole fee IF I get the gig is $37.50, mind you) had to ask me for it. I had to create and send it to them to forward on, and this time I did myself up, put on makeup, and gave them a 27 second slate (instead of 5 seconds). Well, that made it just a little harder to send, that's all, but they said it was okay.

I have sent in my registration to appear at the Lake Geneva Book Fair on July 9. Mark your calendar. I need to sell some first editions before I can order 2nd edition copies of my nonfiction. Plus I have my two new books for you to look at, as well as copies of my copper manuals so you can see what that's all about. Lake Geneva, for me, would be the perfect place for us to move to. I have to see what kind of allergens they have there.

So. Honda has decided to no longer produce the Honda Insight. Well, why am I surprised? They're going to turn the Civic back into a hybrid. Ha. The Civic Hybrid is the first one I owned, back in 2003. You'd think they could support their own products a little better than this? They had a battery charging hybrid but they discontinued that, too! I'm ready to dump Honda. I wish I could come into some money. I'd trade this Insight in on a Ford C-Max that I saw the other day. It's a hybrid that looks like the Honda Fit. I'd help Carrie trade her Fit in on one, too.

Training of a cat. I don't know how many of you use pet doors for your cat. If you have a female, then odds are good she hunts a lot at night. Cats are peculiar, in that they are both predator and prey. So when they catch something, they have to bring it somewhere safe to eat it. Now, during the day she'll bring in live animals; I suspect it's to save them for a night. Why do they have to kill only at night? It's one of the reasons some people think they're devils. But they're not. They're cats. These are inborne instincts. Keanu was in a litter of a feral cat that was dropped on our doorstep. We couldn't tame the mother, who disappeared once we took the kittens inside (oh, not right away, and that was sad. I kept inviting her in but she wouldn't come.).

Do you think increased hunting instinct can be linked to your birth mother? I'm not sure. But Keanu has always been an amazing hunter. This year, though, it's getting to me. The carpeting in my bedroom is still new and she brings her kill in there, usually into my closet, to it. The other day I woke to find a full-grown robin dead on my floor, feathers strewn everywhere, but it appeared Keanu just got tired of ripping feathers off, because the body was intact. Okay, that did it. I told her that either my bedroom was off limits to her at night -- she also loves to sleep with me -- or I have to shut the pet door once she's in for the night. I also shut my office door because that carpeting is new, too.

Well, the first night really upset her. I had to go down to the family room to find her and bring her back up to the bed and give her the morning treats, and then she was okay. The next night I shut the pet door and left my doors open, and she was fine. The next night she thought to trick me. I had the pet door shut, so she asked me to let her out the front door. And when she didn't come back in (she's housebroke), I opened the pet door back up, but I shut the two bedroom doors. The next morning I couldn't find her anywhere to give her the treats, but when I went back into my bedroom, there she was, on my bed. It was like she was saying, okay, I get it. I sure hope she does.

I've finished reading 'Mystic Fire' and I totally love the book. I laughed, I cried, I got angry (very angry) ...... and I wanted more... Monette, it was amazing... if you have not yet read the book, you have to – Eva Mayer, Canada

[Monette] has a gift of capturing your attention with suspense and makes U not want to put either book down. It gets so thrilling U just want to know what will happen next. --Jean in Wisconsin

Very thought provoking, being a history buff myself and especially the Civil War, I found all the twists and turns very compelling. In the end I was so glad you got my Ben and his boys home together just a little tattered, really I very much enjoyed this as I did the first. Thanks for sharing your talent and knowledge of a complex time in our history together with the Cartwrights. --Cheryl/Sadiespinner

Dancing With Cannibals

Two young Belgian prisoners are sent by King Leopold to the Congo in 1906 as part of his conquest of the territory, to be colonists to control the natives and harvest their resources. Simon, former murderer, sees great opportunity and wants nothing more than to be an officer in the Belgian Army. Jean, former thief, had a disturbing dream that tells him not to kick the dog that's eating the dog. The novel follows their adventures to show two dramatically different styles of conquest -- by rape and torture, or by assimilating and conquering from the inside. Dicho Disashi's research of this horrific time period will give readers insights as to reasons for the current state of the Congo today. But readers will also find love, adventure and inspiration, as they come to see cannibals as human beings.

Quick Links

Authors Guild

Advocates for published authors since 1912

Authors Guild Directory

A compendium of member websites