Relic The Copper Ax

BILL COPELAND, B.A, M.S. Cybernetic Systems, has an extensive technical and writing background. For his master thesis, he led a group which produced a detailed report on the development requirements for a space habitat. He led development groups at pioneering organizations, such as NASA, Hewlett-Packard, Tibco, and SAP. He managed multimillion-dollar systems development projects for government and industry, including 3-D rocket inspection systems, satellite signal acquisition, internet development, and financial control systems. He spent many years at pioneering world-class high-tech software and hardware companies in the Silicon Valley. He wrote a series of books which helped major corporations boot-strap the application of powerful financial systems, 3-D rocket inspection systems, satellite signal acquisition, and internet development. He has been a cybernetics engineer and holds a Patent "Airborne Stereoscopic Imaging System. He has also been a video producer and teacher. He has written two science fiction books, Birth of the Cosmic Swan and Cosmic Swan.. As the Silicon Valley Science Reporter, he produced science videos on astronomy and cosmology, including three on the Cosmology Revolution. These videos are available at CosmicSwan.com.

The story is set in central Europe 5300 years ago from the northern alps of Italy, to the eastern lands along the Danube River, and to Vinca, the earliest European Bronze Age civilization. Otzi is the chieftain of a south Tyrollean late stone age tribe scrounging for a living in the high alps. To support his village he travels by foot to trade with the people on the north side of the mountains. He returns to his village after a long trip with a backpack full of goods, but his wife Mara tells him that their wheat field has failed.As a youth he took a trip down the Danube to Vincan lands where he met his father's brother and family who prospered raising goats, farming, and hunting. There he met his first wife, and had to join the hunt for huge wild bison to earn the right to marry her. Before he left for home, a Vincan metal smith told him the secret of smelting copper, and was given a few small copper ore stones to help him find more. He brought his bride back up the Danube but she died during the birth of his son Anise.Desperate to find a way to support his family after the failed wheat crop, he searches the neighborhood for copper ore but finds none. A northerner agrees to go south to get copper ore from Tuscany in trade for goats. With the good ore he is able to make a copper ax, but copper has never been seen before. He is condemned for using evil knowledge to make copper by the shaman and the villagers, and must fight for his life.