Just read an article about Egyptian smithing iron...

[CBrann]

Just read an article about iron beads in Egyptian tombs. The iron  is thought to be metoric in origin, and drawn out to thin layrs and wrapped into a bead form with a hole through the middle. The articles author though this was silly and drilling a hole would have been easier.

 

I was interested in the tim eline that the Egyptians were playing with iron 1,000 years before most documented sources say any one was.

 

Give it  aread, and let me know what you think,

cbrann

 

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-egyptian-beads-meteorite-20130820,0,1388898.story

[ThomasPowers]

Perhaps the author would like to try and drill them using the technology of the time?

[Steve Sells]

funny how he also mentions smelting when in fact there was no smelting required to work metaliac meteorites.  but I agree it would be amusing to watch him drill that rock. Seeing how me mentiones that pounding the space rocks out flat and rolling them up is much harder than drilling them.

[Nobody Special]

Even if they managed drilling, still would have lost more of what would have been an extremely rare material, no? This way would have lost some to scale, but not as much I would think.

 

Remind me to try it with "period" tools and see, if I ever get that incredibly bored and need something that tedious to do.

[ThomasPowers]

So much faster to heat&beat and roll than to drill with the tools of the time. 

 

IIRC it has been shown that Tut's dagger was not meteoritic which is more impressive in a way for the time!  I haven't read a good analysis of the miniature set of iron tools buried with him though.---Anyone know one?

[Frosty]

So much faster to heat&beat and roll than to drill with the tools of the time. 

 

IIRC it has been shown that Tut's dagger was not meteoritic which is more impressive in a way for the time!  I haven't read a good analysis of the miniature set of iron tools buried with him though.---Anyone know one?

 

Doesn't this just go to show I don't keep up to date like I should. The last I heard Tut's dagger was meteoric iron, now they say it's not? Do you  know if they've checked the earlier iron daggers buried with pharaohs and other Egyptian higher ups?

 

I found out a while back Otsie's axe head was bronze not copper and he's cir. 6,500bp. Old school time line, copper age not bronze age.

 

As for the people writing articles saying something specific like drilling being easier than drawing and rolling don't have the practical experience in non-academic crafts to take too seriously. It doesn't make them bad guys, they HAVE to publish so they do and it's a pretty common misconception among the lettered set that one field of expertise extends to others.

 

Frosty The Lucky.

[Bentiron1946]

"That shows these people, 5,000 years ago, were capable of proper smithing,” he said, “which is a much more sophisticated process.”
Folk were capable of proper metal smithing for a long time before they were able to process metal ores for the production of artifacts made of native metals. If one were to look at the axe heads of the upper Midwest in the United States made by the Native Americans during the period of time long before the invasion of Europeans into North America you would find a culture of highly sophisticated proper copper smithing of these axe heads that except for a hole for attachment of a pole almost identical to what one would expect to see in an axe head design in Home Depot today for sale. Just what does the author consider "proper smithing". Or take the metal work of the South American civilizations, are these not proper smiths also? Smithing is more than reducing basic ore into a workable metal, it is also the ability to recognize the and manipulate existing stocks of native and extraterrestrial metals into useful items. I grow weary of authors that think just because something happened three, four or even six thousand years ago that somehow it is a xxxxxxx miracle. I know mankind did not have computers, smartphones or TVs but they did have intellect and hands, that is what separated them from monkeys.