5 ms·

Nobody knows if the modern approach is the same, even if using historically appropriate tools and materials.

by frostburg 8y ago

irrational 8y ago
But if the result is indistinguishable from old examples, does it matter if the approach is different?
- dmix 8y ago
  No, but that doesn't make the phrase "the technique has been lost for centuries" any less true. Which is what the OP is questioning.
- pdpi 8y ago
  The discussion is whether the _technique_ is lost, not whether we can reproduce the results. So... yes, it does matter. It is, in fact, the crux of the matter.
  - stephengillie 8y ago
    If we can map all possible ways of making the material, surely one of them must be the ancient technique.
    - jmcgough 8y ago
      Sure, but we'd still never know which way in particular was used, so it's "lost" in the sense that we can't know what it was to replicate it exactly.
    - sagebird 8y ago
      If we arrange all possible combinations of letters into strings, then we can have all the books which burned in Alexandria. But if you had to walk along an isle in the library of the superset of all possible books, you would die before you came across one that existed. And if you could live forever, there would be uncountable minor varations variations of imposter books before the actual one.
      - grzm 8y ago
        If this isn't already the plot to a Borges short story, it should be.
        nytopop 8y ago
        It is - The Library of Babel.
        grzm 8y ago
        Sounds like I'm past due for pulling Labyrinths out of storage.
ggm 8y ago
Here's a hypothetical. Say we do archeology, and find remains from wootz which include crystals which can only form at a given maximum temp, and others which only form at a given minimum temp, and slag which has like properties, and other evidence of quenching at specific times in the production cycle. If we collect enough of this, would you actually accept we had re-discovered the technique or would you nit-pick it to death? If for example, plunging the blade into the belly of a slave doesn't materially alter production, do we fail to make it the same way, if we don't do it? Primo Levi writes about an industrial chemical plant adding sal volatile to a paint recipe because "thats how they do it" when he originated the technique to counter excessive acidty (or alkinility, I forget which) during post war conditions which no longer applied. I think this is worth bearing on, because it made absolutely NO difference to the paint, but persisted as a process. You think this didn't happen in Wootz manufacture?
DannyBee 8y ago
This is true, but we know the result is the same: " J.D Verhoeven and Alfred Pendray reconstructed methods of production, proved the role of impurities of ore in the pattern creation, and reproduced Wootz steel with patterns microscopically and visually identical to one of the ancient blade patterns. Reibold et al's analyses spoke of the presence of carbon nanotubes enclosing nanowires of cementite, with the trace elements/impurities of vanadium, molybdenum, chromium etc contributing to their creation, in cycles of heating/cooling/forging. This resulted in a hard high carbon steel that remained malleable [25] There are other smiths who are now consistently producing Wootz steel blades visually identical to the old patterns.[26]" I'm not sure what more you would want :) IE the article claims " Anyone claiming to be making authentic Wootz/Damascus these days is delusional". Regardless of technique, this is almost certainly wrong. The end result is almost certainly authentic wootz/damascus, even if the technique is different. and the technique may not be different anyway. The point of that research in the first sentence was basically "it's unclear they did anything that special, it seems to mostly be due to local impurities" (A short summary is here: http://www.thetruthaboutknives.com/2017/06/knifemaking-legend-al-pendray-father-of-modern-wootz-has-passed/ http://www.thetruthaboutknives.com/2017/06/knifemaking-legen...) In particular, a very low percent of vanadium impurity produces the pattern (see https://insa.nic.in/writereaddata/UpLoadedFiles/IJHS/Vol42_4_2_JVerhoeven.pdf https://insa.nic.in/writereaddata/UpLoadedFiles/IJHS/Vol42_4...) and the other properties are due to other historical impurities that would have been found in the area it was produced.

Nobody knows if the modern approach is the same, even if using historically appropriate tools and materials.

irrational 8y ago

But if the result is indistinguishable from old examples, does it matter if the approach is different?

dmix 8y ago
No, but that doesn't make the phrase "the technique has been lost for centuries" any less true. Which is what the OP is questioning.
pdpi 8y ago
The discussion is whether the _technique_ is lost, not whether we can reproduce the results. So... yes, it does matter. It is, in fact, the crux of the matter.
- stephengillie 8y ago
  If we can map all possible ways of making the material, surely one of them must be the ancient technique.
  - jmcgough 8y ago
    Sure, but we'd still never know which way in particular was used, so it's "lost" in the sense that we can't know what it was to replicate it exactly.
  - sagebird 8y ago
    If we arrange all possible combinations of letters into strings, then we can have all the books which burned in Alexandria. But if you had to walk along an isle in the library of the superset of all possible books, you would die before you came across one that existed. And if you could live forever, there would be uncountable minor varations variations of imposter books before the actual one.
    - grzm 8y ago
      If this isn't already the plot to a Borges short story, it should be.
      - nytopop 8y ago
        It is - The Library of Babel.
        grzm 8y ago
        Sounds like I'm past due for pulling Labyrinths out of storage.

ggm 8y ago

Here's a hypothetical. Say we do archeology, and find remains from wootz which include crystals which can only form at a given maximum temp, and others which only form at a given minimum temp, and slag which has like properties, and other evidence of quenching at specific times in the production cycle. If we collect enough of this, would you actually accept we had re-discovered the technique or would you nit-pick it to death? If for example, plunging the blade into the belly of a slave doesn't materially alter production, do we fail to make it the same way, if we don't do it? Primo Levi writes about an industrial chemical plant adding sal volatile to a paint recipe because "thats how they do it" when he originated the technique to counter excessive acidty (or alkinility, I forget which) during post war conditions which no longer applied. I think this is worth bearing on, because it made absolutely NO difference to the paint, but persisted as a process. You think this didn't happen in Wootz manufacture?

DannyBee 8y ago

This is true, but we know the result is the same: " J.D Verhoeven and Alfred Pendray reconstructed methods of production, proved the role of impurities of ore in the pattern creation, and reproduced Wootz steel with patterns microscopically and visually identical to one of the ancient blade patterns. Reibold et al's analyses spoke of the presence of carbon nanotubes enclosing nanowires of cementite, with the trace elements/impurities of vanadium, molybdenum, chromium etc contributing to their creation, in cycles of heating/cooling/forging. This resulted in a hard high carbon steel that remained malleable [25] There are other smiths who are now consistently producing Wootz steel blades visually identical to the old patterns.[26]" I'm not sure what more you would want :) IE the article claims " Anyone claiming to be making authentic Wootz/Damascus these days is delusional". Regardless of technique, this is almost certainly wrong. The end result is almost certainly authentic wootz/damascus, even if the technique is different. and the technique may not be different anyway. The point of that research in the first sentence was basically "it's unclear they did anything that special, it seems to mostly be due to local impurities" (A short summary is here: http://www.thetruthaboutknives.com/2017/06/knifemaking-legend-al-pendray-father-of-modern-wootz-has-passed/ http://www.thetruthaboutknives.com/2017/06/knifemaking-legen...) In particular, a very low percent of vanadium impurity produces the pattern (see https://insa.nic.in/writereaddata/UpLoadedFiles/IJHS/Vol42_4_2_JVerhoeven.pdf https://insa.nic.in/writereaddata/UpLoadedFiles/IJHS/Vol42_4...) and the other properties are due to other historical impurities that would have been found in the area it was produced.