[blam]

"The problem I have with different takes on the idea that the Great Lakes copper fueled the Mediterranean bronze age (most recently, Gavin Menzies in his book on the Minoans) are the navigational barriers, such as Niagara Falls. Until the construction of the 18th- and 19th-century canals (to some extent), the Soo Locks, and the 20th century St Lawrence seaway, moving literally millions of tons of copper out of Lake Superior and into world trade routes, by water, appears to have been (ahem) impractical."

I am of a similar opinion. The 'missing' copper cannot be found in the Americas is a good argument for it being some where else though, lol.

A matching of the isotopes in Med/Michigan copper would convince me.

[SunkenCiv]

One of the problems with the “missing” copper arguments is that it isn’t necessarily missing; the copper shows up in sites all over North and Central America. While that shows that it did move long distances, it probably moved overland, or in small quantities via canoe. Another problem is, how much was actually mined? Estimates are fine, but can’t be used very effectively as evidence.

One of the problems on the other side of the question is, where did the copper in the ancient Mediterranean market originate? Cyprus (which apparently got its name from copper itself) was an important source, and the oxhide ingots found on, for example, the Ulu Burun wreck, look like the oxhide ingots portrayed in at least one bit of Egyptian wall art — and the copper is attributed to Keftiu, a transliteration of Caphtor, which was Cyprus (not Crete, as is generally claimed, including in Menzies’ book).

[snip] If Caphtor is not Cyprus, then the Old Testament completely omits reference to this large island close to the Syrian coast. The phonetics of the name also point to Cyprus. Separately I show that Tarshish was the name of Crete. [/snip] http://www.varchive.org/ce/baalbek/caphtor.htm

[snip] The identities of the first two countries mentioned by Esarhaddon are known: Iadanan is Cyprus and Iaman is the Ionian coast of Asia Minor; the location of Tarshishi, however, became the subject of some debate, for this statement by Esarhaddon is the only time the name appears in any Assyrian text. It was noted that “Tarshishi” has the determinative mat for “country” in front of it, as do Idanana, or Cyprus and Iaman, or Ionia. The only clue to its location was its being described as a kingdom “amidst the sea”, apparently somewhat farther removed from Assyria than either Cyprus or Ionia. [/snip] http://www.varchive.org/nldag/tarshish.htm