Copper is a comparatively soft and ductile metallic element (symbol Cu) with a distinct reddish colour with a high electrical and thermal conductivity - among the pure metals at room temperature, only silver has a higher electrical conductivity - hence large quantities are used in cables for the conduction of electricity. Because it occurs 'native', as well as in various ores, and is easily worked, it may well be the first metal to have been used by man.
As well as a constituent of various ores, copper can be found 'native' in the metallic form.
Naturally occuring in its metallic state and easily worked, copper may have been the first metal to have been used by man and copper artifacts have been found dating as far back as 8,700 BC. Copper beads have been found in Iraq dating back 11,000 years while, in the New World, it was mined around Lake Superior in Michigan 7,000 years ago.
The Ancient Greeks knew the metal as 'Chalkos' or 'Kuprios', from 'Kupros', or Cyprus, and the Romans also called it 'aes Cyprium' after Cyprus which was a major source of copper in ancient times. This Roman phrase was simplified to 'cuprum' and later Anglicized to it modern English form.
Soft on its own, alloyed with tin to make bronze it is much harder and more durable and was used for thausands of years before the advent of iron working, giving rise to the period known as the 'Bronze Age'. To obtain the tin to make bronze, the Phoenecians sailed from the Mediterannean to Cornwall and, because of this trade, named the British Isles the 'Cassiterides' or 'tin isles'.
The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid of Cheops (Khufu) was plumbed throughout in copper pipes - the system was still in perfect working order when re-discovered in the 20th century and the the best preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls was written on copper.
Exposed to atmospheric moisture and oxygen, copper rapidly oxides to become covered in a distinctively green thin layer of copper oxide known as 'verdigris' which prevents the metal from further odixation. Wooden ships, particularly those plying warm waters, were clad with thin copper sheets below the waterline to prevent their timbers being attacked by boring organisms.
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The modern symbol for female . . .
. . . was also the symbol used by the alchemists for copper and by the Ancient Egyptians . . .
. . . known as 'ankh', meant life.
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