In another thread, gold artifacts were mentioned.

http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,236561

They are from a Meso-American location and during a period that overlapped the BofM timeline. But the metal at that location during that time was cold worked, not smelted.

If Meso-America is the BofM lands, how come metallurgy (smelting) began much further to the south? How come it did not show up in Meso-America until after the BofM period ended?

Here are two articles:

1. Intensive Pre-Incan Metallurgy Recorded by Lake Sediments from the Bolivian Andes, Science, Vol. 301, 26 September 2003

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/301/5641/1893.abstract

New World metallurgy emerged in the Andean region of South America. Hammered foils and gilded copper date to 1400 to 1100 B.C. By 1000 AD large scale copper smelting and bronze production was occuring in Peru.

Metallurgy did not show up in Meso-America until about 800 AD.

2. Ancient West Mexican Metallurgy: South and Central American Origins and West Mexican Transformations, American Anthropologist, December 1988

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/aa.1988.90.4.02a00040/abstract

One more thing about cold working of metal. Objects in Meso-America during the BofM timeline don't prove anything because cold metal work with copper in the United States region began about 7,000 years ago, in the Lake Superior basin.

http://www.ramtops.co.uk/copper.html

There was nothing special about metal work in ancient America that needs to be explained by BofM people making ocean crossings from the "cradle of civilization".

Copper smelting and bronze production occurred before Columbus but not where apologists claim the BofM happened. Iron smelting sites for the manufacture of swords have not been found because they exist only in the fantasy world of the BofM.

As a nevermo, I can tell you what's going to happen. The church will buy time. They will say that not all of the Americas have been discovered. So, buried in some mountain or hill is evidence of an ancient civilization here that need metallurgy. (Evidently, they're going to try to wait it out - past our lifetimes.)

And they'll say that steel rod doesn't actually mean it's composed of steel. Instead, it just means "sturdy" and not necessarily made of a metal.

My mormon ex-colleague's elderly parents were in Peru because according to them there's a scriptural connection to the Peruvian city's ruins. I know one thing: they don't come back with an ounce of evidence proving the BoM right.

I think these links just show you how many blatant lies there are in the BoM. And how badly the members' really want to believe it.