Traditional metal working in Mexico more. Important metal working centers include Taxco for silver, Santa Clara del Cobre for copper, Celaya for tin and Zacatecas for wrought iron. Metal working in Mesoamerica, especially of silver, gold and copper was advanced by the time the Spanish arrived, mostly concentrated in the modern states of Michoacán, Oaxaca and Guerrero. The mining and working of metals probably came to Mesoamerican cultures from the south. Metal working was principally in gold, silver, tin and lead, with some copper work known in what is now Michoacán. Gold was generally obtained in powder or pellet form in rivers and streams from
Native metal brass, bronze, pewter, German silver, osmiridium, electrum, white gold, and silver-mercury and gold-mercury amalgam. Only gold, silver, copper and the platinum metals occur in nature in large amounts. Over geological time scales, very few metals can resist natural weathering processes like oxidation, which is why generally only the less reactive metals such as gold and platinum are found as native metals. The others usually occur as isolated pockets where a natural chemical process reduces a common compound or ore of the metal, leaving the pure metal behind as small flakes or inclusions. Non-metallic elements occurring in the native state include