How people made sword in back days like 600s because there was no technology so how the find ion and made lots of sword and extra?? Thanks
Answers
The first iron used came from meteorites and was already in pure form (e.g. Tut-Ankh-Amun’s dagger during the bronze period). As iron meteorites are quite rare, iron back then was very valuable.
Later people found out how iron ores could be recognised and smelted. I assume that the first lump of iron came from somebody accidentally throwing a piece of iron ore into a ceramic kiln. But by this time furnaces existes to smelt copper and tin from their ores, so the basic technology was there, including blowers and manufacturing charcoal as a fuel.
Most early iron produces in Europe came from bog iron ore, which is formed by bacterial action in swamps and can simply be dug out using a shovel.
Early smelters used one time furnaces built out of clay, with a simple blower. Those chimney like structures (bloomeries) were fed from the top with alternating layers of crushed ore, maybe limestone as a flux and charcoal as a fuel and reducing agent. The result, after a day or two of continuous smelting was a “bloom”, a lump of iron mixed with slag, which was recovered by knocking down the furnace. This red hot lump was then beaten and folded with big hammers to homogenise it and to drive out the slag. The result was “wrought iron”, which is very pure, quite corrosion resistant and easy to forge and forge weld, but which is also quite soft.
To make steel for cutting edges the carbon content of the iron had to be increased, this was done by packing wrought iron rods into an airtight container, together wich char coal dust and organic material, and then let it sit in a furnace at white heat for several days. After this time the iron would have absorbed carbon from the coal dust and turned into steel, which was them stretched and forged into raw bars for sale.