Yup. Here's one to chew on:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baghdad_BatteryI don't see it as "impossible" or "unlikely" for these to have been used as battery-cells and possibly as an electoplating current source. Not saying they were,
but I can't say they weren't, either.In fact, to me, it's implausible that they were used to store papyrus scrolls, which is the accepted theory of their use.
Suuuure. Roll up the scroll and slip it into a copper tube, then stick an iron rod down the center, pack the whole assembly into a pottery jar and seal it up with bitumen.
Ayup!You know how curious folks such as you and me have dinked around with stuff and made interesting discoveries. In fact, a lot of stuff like gunpowder was probably discovered serendipitously.
Some guy for whatever reason was dinking around and poured the powder from dried urine on a fire (maybe just to get rid of it "greenly"
) and lo! the fire blazed more brightly. Down the road in the next village somebody hears about this and mixes dried piss with charcoal to see if he can use it to get a fire going more rapidly.
And so on.
Yet it was never really written down or documented in any chinese laboratory notebooks. We just have the results after hundreds (thousands?) of years of guys just dinking around: BANG.
Hey, we've got a lot of back-history that's been lost (perhaps much of it because of the losses in the Alexandria library) and just because no plated artifacts have been found (or so we think) or the fact that there didn't appear to be any means of connection of the copper tube to the outside world in the Baghdad Battery doesn't mean there wasn't.
And they probably just used vinegar for an electrolyte.
So the "Occam's Razor" explanation of them being used to store scrolls is the accepted "best" one.
But sometimes Occam's Razor is a bit dull.
And Eurocentric, as well.
Terry