In the year 1852, the journal Scientific American (June 5) carried an intriguing report of a metallic vase blasted out of solid rock at Dorchester, Massachusetts, near the city of Boston. Describing the vase, which was about 4.5 inches high, the report said:

“The body of this vessel resembles zinc in color, or a composition metal in which there is a considerable portion of silver. On the side there are six figures of a flower or bouquet beautifully inlaid with silver, and around the lower part of the vessel, a vine, or wreath, also inlaid with silver. The chasing, carving, and inlaying are exquisitely done by the art of some cunning workman. This curious and unknown vessel was blown out of the solid pudding stone, fifteen feet below the surface.”

The “pudding stone” is known to geologists as the Roxbury Conglomerate, and according to the United States Geological Survey, this rock is of Precambrian age, over 600 million years old. Given that the vase is of human manufacture, this is quite extraordinary. According to standard views, there would have been no life on land at this time, and only simple forms of marine life in the earth’s oceans.