Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - Meteoric iron used for keris's vs. for Indian weapons

tom hyle · 17th February 2005, 12:13 PM

This is one of those threads I read the first half page of in real time, then it just "exploded" behind my back! In typical fashion, I'm responding while only 1/2 finished catching up.......I think the metal "not standing" beneath the hammer means that it cracked and crumbled when hammered upon, which wootz is also said to do if not worked properly, or perhaps if its chemistry is a little off, as with the meteor. Combining it (by hammering or melting I don't think is told?) with terrestrial metal diluted the impurity that caused the problem, allowing the metal to be worked ordinarily. The hope, I suppose, was that something about its chemistry might be bizarre and helpful. Odd pockets of terrestrial ores were known to have such properties. Skofnung and his brothers were said to have nonrusting edges. The Chinese didn't bother with iron weapons at first (until they got inexpensive, or until they improved?), because an impurity in one of the ores used in their bronze made it comparable....
Cut iron meteors display a flake-board-like pattern of angled crystals called a Windmenstatten pattern (spelling probably way off on that one), but only if cut/ground into; any hot working destroys this pattern, which could only be remade under the conditions of outer space or whatever. So, yeah, apart from burning a sample for spectroscopy, I don't think there's any way to tell the origins of a piece of forged iron. Musea and universities do it to things to follow ancient trade routes; "this dagger blade is made with copper from the Caucases...." etc. K(e)ris tangs are, AFAIK, formed by the two side plates of the blade, the cutting layer or core steel having stopped at or before the ganga, or at most within the first inch of tang. The two side plates of pamor metal are welded to each other, and then usually twisted together, too, so a tang tip actually should work, yes? I don't think I've seen any with tang extensions welded for length?

17th February 2005, 12:13 PM	#84
tom hyle Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Houston, TX, USA Posts: 1,254	This is one of those threads I read the first half page of in real time, then it just "exploded" behind my back! In typical fashion, I'm responding while only 1/2 finished catching up.......I think the metal "not standing" beneath the hammer means that it cracked and crumbled when hammered upon, which wootz is also said to do if not worked properly, or perhaps if its chemistry is a little off, as with the meteor. Combining it (by hammering or melting I don't think is told?) with terrestrial metal diluted the impurity that caused the problem, allowing the metal to be worked ordinarily. The hope, I suppose, was that something about its chemistry might be bizarre and helpful. Odd pockets of terrestrial ores were known to have such properties. Skofnung and his brothers were said to have nonrusting edges. The Chinese didn't bother with iron weapons at first (until they got inexpensive, or until they improved?), because an impurity in one of the ores used in their bronze made it comparable.... Cut iron meteors display a flake-board-like pattern of angled crystals called a Windmenstatten pattern (spelling probably way off on that one), but only if cut/ground into; any hot working destroys this pattern, which could only be remade under the conditions of outer space or whatever. So, yeah, apart from burning a sample for spectroscopy, I don't think there's any way to tell the origins of a piece of forged iron. Musea and universities do it to things to follow ancient trade routes; "this dagger blade is made with copper from the Caucases...." etc. K(e)ris tangs are, AFAIK, formed by the two side plates of the blade, the cutting layer or core steel having stopped at or before the ganga, or at most within the first inch of tang. The two side plates of pamor metal are welded to each other, and then usually twisted together, too, so a tang tip actually should work, yes? I don't think I've seen any with tang extensions welded for length? Last edited by tom hyle; 17th February 2005 at 12:43 PM.