Copper saw and metal woodworking tools
Sierra de cobre y herramientas de carpintería metálicas
- Date
- c. 3000 BCE · confidence high
- Place
- Saqqara and Giza, Egypt
- Credited to
- Egyptian carpenters and masons of the 1st-4th Dynasties
- Field
- Tools
What it is
Toothed copper blades, along with adzes, chisels and bow drills, that allowed cedar boards to be cut and limestone blocks and granite to be sawn with sand abrasive. They form the first complete set of carpenter's and mason's tools.
The harder bronze saw replaces the copper one around 2000 BCE; the iron saw arrives after 1200 BCE.
What it led to
- Joinery of assembled boards: boats, coffins, furniture and hinged doors
- Precision-carved stone architecture (pyramids, granite sarcophagi)
- Carpenter and mason trades in state service, paid in rations
Built on
- Cold-hammered native copperc. 8000 BCE
- Bow drillc. 7000 BCE
- Polished-stone adze