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Can anyone explain iron - unless it is steel (which was not a common knowledge trough history) it is worse than bronze in every aspect. So what lead to the iron
by ReptileMan 1y ago
Can anyone explain iron - unless it is steel (which was not a common knowledge trough history) it is worse than bronze in every aspect. So what lead to the iron age?
- noduerme 1y agoAnemia? Also, the earth made way more sense when it was flat.
- chrisco255 1y agoTin was hard to come by in those days and necessary for bronze. Late bronze age led to civilizational collapse and trade networks that distributed tin broke down. Iron was more abundant and could be more useful by itself than copper alone. May have been used for farm implements at first.
- arnsholt 1y agoTo expand on "tin was hard to come by", I believe two major sources of tin have been identified for bronze used in the Fertile Crescent: one in Cornwall, and one in Afghanistan. They had to travel really far abroad to make this stuff.
- bluGill 1y agoThe early processes for smelting iron resulted in a little steel which would be easy to collect and save for one big work. Over thousands of years you learn more and more of how to 'encourage this'
- aidenn0 1y ago1. Once you know how to make a hot enough furnace, iron is cheaper to make than bronze. Instead of finding copper and tin ore separately, you just need red rocks and a whole lot of trees. Quantity can trump quality. 2. There was steel in use already prior to 1000BC. High Carbon steel was being produced in both Europe and Asia by 400 BC. When people say "the iron age" it includes the usage of steel (which is mostly iron).
- tstrimple 1y agoAnd there are drastically more red rocks than green ones available. Iron makes up something like 5% of the earth’s crust. Copper is around 0.006%. On parts of the earth you could just pick up chunks of iron from bogs. It was literally just lying around.
- peterfirefly 1y agoTransportation costs used to be huge.