On a cold and snowy night...did some digging.
FYI
Discussing fire methods along with Pyrite possibility by.. Ortiz -The Ice Man
(And I suck at bow drills...LOL)
I had heard about this method of fire making while reading "Clan of the Cave Bear"....By Jean M. Auel
Part of a series of books...Recommended for primitive references... but read with a grain of salt.
It is a novel...and a film, starring our blond heroine, Daryl Hannah (always was kind smitten...LOL)....as Alya...who single handed discovered 10000 years of technology....LOL
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Clan_of_the_Cave_Bear
Anyway.....had a couple of hunks of pyrite in my boyhood rock collection...so tried it and did spark it...didn't catch
my char cloth...that I use with my flint(chert) and steel.
Seems I had been using the wrong kind of pyrite...I was using "fools gold"
Primitive Strike a Light
Paleolithic Stone on Stone Fire Technology.......by Susan Labiste
http://www.primitiveways.com/marcasi...d%20flint.html
Quote>
I’ve heard a lot of primitive technologist proclaim that it is difficult, if not impossible, to get a fire-producing spark from any iron pyrite including marcasite. This pre-steel stone on stone technology uses a flint to strike a spark much in the same manner as flint and steel. Yet the ethnographic records, and indeed the archaeological records, show numerous examples of Stone Age “strike-a-light’s” predating the invention of steel. It seemed it must be an effective technology. If it were not more easily employed than friction, it is doubtful it would have been used. Perhaps we moderns just don’t know the details of how it was done. Still, those naysayers were folks who had no problem producing fire with flint and steel. The problem piqued my curiosity, so I began a quest to learn more. This article is an attempt to share an exploration into what it takes to produce an ember with stone on stone fire technology.< seems to have been around a long time.
For what it worth.....
Anyone have any marcasite?
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