The earliest metals collected are the ones easiest to obtain because they exist naturally in their metallic form, like gold or copper. Simply heat the rock and the metal melts out. Then we learned a few more advanced methods such as crushing the rock before heating would help get even more of it out.
Modern extraction methods can include removing metals which are not in metallic form by dissolving the rocks in acids then precipitating the metals out of the solution in metallic form.
The earliest metal humans used was copper, which they got from just chunks of it or using tools the extract visible veins from rock. The next step would have been using small furnaces and burning pits to extract copper from ore.
beyond that, it’s hard to answer because this question is super vague. What metals? What time period are you asking about? The answer really depends.
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The earliest metals collected are the ones easiest to obtain because they exist naturally in their metallic form, like gold or copper. Simply heat the rock and the metal melts out. Then we learned a few more advanced methods such as crushing the rock before heating would help get even more of it out.
Modern extraction methods can include removing metals which are not in metallic form by dissolving the rocks in acids then precipitating the metals out of the solution in metallic form.
The earliest metal humans used was copper, which they got from just chunks of it or using tools the extract visible veins from rock. The next step would have been using small furnaces and burning pits to extract copper from ore.
beyond that, it’s hard to answer because this question is super vague. What metals? What time period are you asking about? The answer really depends.