smelting

Pyrgos Mavroraki Smelting and Melting Experiments in a Metallurgical Workshop of the Second Millennium BC

Maria Rosaria Belgiorno and
Livio Pontieri (IT)
EXARC Journal Issue 2021/2
Experimental Archaeology
Interpreting the cultural influences of Cyprus in antiquity has posed an issue, depending on one’s point of view or the different conclusions reached. Until the 1970s, in large part due to the extensive excavations along the northern coast of Cyprus, it seemed reasonable to recognise a plethora of Aegean traits in the island culture. Every element of the Cypriot Bronze Age was analysed and interpreted in...

Standardized Reporting of Experimental Iron Smelting - A modest (?) Proposal

Darrell Markewitz (CA)
EXARC Journal Issue 2021/1
Experimental Archaeology

Background: The State of an Art?

Over the last three decades, bloomery iron smelting has moved from the largely theoretical to the practical. Although there were certainly earlier attempts via experimental process to build workable furnaces, most of these attempts were basically unsuccessful, at least in terms of actual iron production. Early researchers too often undertook (or at least only formally reported on) limited test series (one or two attempts) and many concentrated far too much on slag, not on the production of metallic iron itself.

The Variation of Elastic Modulus and Changes of Structures and Mineral Phases in Rocks as Parameters for the Identification of Fire-Setting in Ancient Mines

Angela Celauro (IT) and
Alexander Maass (DE)
EXARC Journal Issue 2019/1
Experimental Archaeology
The article is focused on the creation of a protocol for the analytical characterization of fire-setting in different types of rock. A set of experiments of heating and cooling have been carried out on different kind of rocks under various conditions and durations in order to record changes in the structures and composition of the samples. This study was set to support the solution of issues in the case of...

Bloom

A bloomery is a type of furnace once widely used for smelting iron from its oxides. A bloomery's product is a porous mass of iron and slag called a bloom.

Smelting

Processing an ore such as iron by melting it in order to separate out the crude metal.
Definition source: Chambers 21st Century Dictionary

Book Review: Accidental and Experimental Archaeometallurgy by D. Dungworth and R. Doonan (Eds)

Dave Budd (UK)
EXARC Journal Issue 2015/1
Mixed Matters
Spawned from an HMS (Historical Metallurgy Society) conference at West Dean College in 2010, this book is a unique compilation of papers written by both academics and craftsmen. Further articles not directly drawn from the conference have been included and cover non-ferrous experiments and an ethnographic study of blacksmithing...

From the Soil to the Iron Product - the Technology of Medieval Iron Smelting

Adam Thiele (HU)
EXARC Journal Issue 2014/2
Ancient Technology
2013 EXARC meeting at Csiki Pihenökert (HU)
***Nowadays, the development of technology rushes past the people of the machine-based technical civilisation, therefore they fail to understand the technological wonders that surround them. One of these is the ancient technology of iron smelting...

Copper + Tin + People: Public Co-Smelting Experimentation in Northwestern Iberia

Aaron Lackinger (ES)
EXARC Journal Issue 2013/3
Experimental Archaeology
7th UK EA Conference Cardiff 2013
***In the present paper an experiment made in north-western Iberia for producing bronze using local ores and similar techniques to those perhaps practiced by the ancient prehistoric metallurgists during Bronze Age is described...