The Classification of Early Iron-Smelting Furnaces

Abstract

SummaryThe paper begins by surveying the different types of early iron-smelting furnace, based on a tentative classification proposed by Coghlan in 1956. The ambiguities in this classification are indicated, together with examples of furnaces that do not fall easily into one of its three categories.On the basis of data derived principally from furnaces of the Early Iron Age and Roman periods from northern Europe, the author proposes a new classification into two main groups, differentiated by their provisions or otherwise for the removal of molten slag during the iron-smelting operation. Each of these groups is further subdivided, according to the shape of the furnace superstructure and/or the method of supplying the air blast.

Say it in Iron. Symbols of Transformation and Reproduction in the European Iron Age

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Classification et chronologie de bas fourneaux de réduction du fer à usage unique au sud-ouest du Niger

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Uncles of the nation: avuncular masculinity in partition-era politics

“…She draws attention to a nineteenth-century colloquial use of avuncularism as a euphemism for a pawnbroker's trade: to do business with one was to borrow money from 'one's uncle'. 17 Victorian uncles are frequent benefactors: sometimes mysterious adventurers, or dwellers in far-away lands like India, Victorian uncles come to 'stand for a set of possibilities that are made possible by capitalist enterprise'. 18 Through Sedgwick and Cleere, an image of the Victorian bachelor uncle emerges that has two sides -the benevolent, nonreproductive, possibly queer uncle and the curmudgeonly wealthy uncle who may not reproduce, but masters capitalist production.…”