Technological tradition of the Mongol Empire as inferred from bloomery and cast iron objects excavated in Karakorum

Park, Jang-Sik; Reichert, Susanne

doi:10.1016/j.jas.2014.10.005

Cited by 15 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 8 publications

(5 reference statements)

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“…). It is important to note that based on our prior research, the technological landscape encountered at Delgerkhaan Uul is quite different from that documented at the roughly contemporary site of Karakorum, the capital of the Mongol Empire, where fully established bloomery‐based technology served as the primary means for iron production (Park and Reichert ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 83%

“…Recent analysis of Mongolian bronze and iron objects from a variety of contexts and periods demonstrates that nomadic communities in Mongolia had a long history of indigenous metalwork informed by neighbouring traditions (Park et al . , , Park and Reichert ). This pattern is clearly evident in the use of bloomery‐based iron technology from the Xiongnu period onward, which is fundamentally different from the cast‐iron tradition dominant in China.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…). Its application, however, was limited to the making of items such as simple domestic tools and farming implements requiring no strict control over the mechanical properties of the materials employed (Park and Reichert ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Novel Micro‐Scale Steel‐Making from Molten Cast Iron Practised in Medieval Nomadic Communities of East Mongolia

2018

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Evidence of novel steel-making was found in a number of small cast-iron fragments recovered by the Mongolia-American archaeological survey of eastern Mongolia. These iron artefacts come from medieval period habitation and manufacturing sites and they consistently display irregular surface features characteristic of a solidification reaction from a partially molten state. Their microstructure consists of large near-spherical islands of pearlite spread on a background of fine white cast-iron eutectic. Reflected in this peculiar structure is an extremely small-scale steel-making process where one or more small pieces of cast iron were heated above the eutectic temperature for rapid decarburization in the partially molten state. We provide a detailed account of the technological aspects of this micro-scale steel-making method as observed in the microstructure and chemical composition of the objects examined. This small-scale technology was ideally suited to the pastoral nomadic way of life that characterized medieval eastern Mongolia; however, it probably would not have been appropriate for sedentary communities with access to large-scale urban manufacturing centres. Based on this observation, we discuss the role of nomadic lifeways and associated political environments that likely influenced the development of this innovative steel-making technique.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

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Novel Micro‐Scale Steel‐Making from Molten Cast Iron Practised in Medieval Nomadic Communities of East Mongolia

2018

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“…The similar mineralogy of these slag is further reflected in their bulk chemical composition; samples have moderate FeO (27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42) wt.%), moderate SiO2 (37-43 wt.%), and elevated to moderate CaO (7-19 wt.%) contents (Table 6, for the individual bulk area analyses see Supplementary Table S2). On the ternary diagrams FeO-CaO-SiO2 and FeO-Al2O3-SiO2, slag of WCB and slag of MCB generally plot in proximate domains.…”

Section: Type Of Slagmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…The negative impact of sulphur on the metal is associated with the formation of iron sulphide-metal eutectics, which melts during temperatures of hot forging of iron (at 988 • C) causing brittleness of the metal [33] (p. 39). By modern metallurgy standards, steel with sulphur levels higher than 0.03 wt.% is considered too brittle for most purposes, while in the past, iron with sulphur levels up to 1.1-1.5 wt.% was sometimes used in the manufacture of various objects [9] (p. 21), [34]. Only two out of the nine samples of Negev blooms reveal sulphur levels higher than 0.5 wt.% indicating a poor-quality metal.…”

Section: Effect Of Sulphur and Copper On Ironmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing the Quality of Iron Ores for Bloomery Smelting: Laboratory Experiments

2019

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There is fragmentary knowledge of iron ore sources exploited in the past for many regions including the Southern Levant. This missing information has the potential to shed light on political, economic, craft-production, and trading patterns of past societies. This paper presents the results of smelting experiments performed in graphite crucibles and a muffle furnace, using 14 iron ore samples from the Southern Levant, in an attempt to determine their suitability for smelting using ancient techniques. A range of analytical techniques, including optical and electron microscopy, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray powder diffraction, and portable X-ray fluorescence were used to comparatively investigate the mineralogy and composition of the precursor iron ores and their smelting products: Iron bloom and slag. Several parameters attesting to the ability of a given ore to be successfully reduced and consolidated into a solid metal mass were quantified. The generated results highlight the significance of a 'correct balance' between iron oxides and other major elements in the smelting system in order to form fluid slag and a well-consolidated bloom. These data contribute to the understanding of factors, potentially influencing choices of iron ore exploitation by past human societies in the Southern Levant.The assaying (i.e., small-scale experimentation to determine quality of an ore) has always been an important component of ancient technology, as it represented an easy and resource-efficient technique to predict and coordinate subsequent large-scale processing and smelting [17]. For past societies, this was an advantage, given that properties of materials could be grasped only empirically and use of metallic resources was often associated with high resource and labor costs (e.g., extraction, transportation, and processing of the ore and fuel, cf. iron production in Africa [18]). The assay furnaces described by Agricolla [19] are a historical example of methods traditionally used for cupellation of small amounts of costly argentiferous ores to predict the outcome of large-scale cupellation performed in larger furnaces set to a greater consumption of raw materials.Determining the iron content and the quality of iron ores, prior to large-scale bloomery smelting, thus, is highly advantageous. Significantly, despite the common occurrence of iron ores in nature, knowledge about the types of deposits exploited in the past often remains limited and poorly understood. In fact, for some regions of the Ancient Near East, for example, south-eastern Arabia and Cyprus, there is still a lack of evidence about indigenous iron ore exploitation, although certain types of iron-rich rocks (e.g., gossans) exist in these regions [20][21][22][23]. Whereas in other regions, such as the southern Levant, evidence of past ore exploitation is only known so far from the Mugharet el-Wardeh deposit in the Ajloun, Jordan [5,24], although this is certainly not the only ore deposit in the region.In this paper, we present the results of a ser...

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The implication of the metallurgical traditions associated with Chinese style wagons from the royal Xiongnu tomb at Golmod 2 in Mongolia

Park

Erdenebaatar

Eregzen

2017

Archaeol Anthropol Sci

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Technological tradition of the Mongol Empire as inferred from bloomery and cast iron objects excavated in Karakorum

Cited by 15 publications

References 8 publications

Novel Micro‐Scale Steel‐Making from Molten Cast Iron Practised in Medieval Nomadic Communities of East Mongolia

Novel Micro‐Scale Steel‐Making from Molten Cast Iron Practised in Medieval Nomadic Communities of East Mongolia

Assessing the Quality of Iron Ores for Bloomery Smelting: Laboratory Experiments

The implication of the metallurgical traditions associated with Chinese style wagons from the royal Xiongnu tomb at Golmod 2 in Mongolia

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