A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
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Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#2> Sparkly hematite mineral was used as a flux by copper smelters. Its distinctive appearance may have helped to attract attention from ancient miners and prospectors.
Every once in a while I pull up some Wikipedia article with idle curiosity of "If I were transported back in time, could I usefully help this get invented?"
One result of this is a helpless appreciation for how complicated it can be to even identify what kind of substance is present without a staggeringly complex dependency-tree of identifying other chemicals, assaying tests, and the economic surplus to use reagents for analysis.
Things could have been very different if iron ore was hard to distinguish.
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#3> Sparkly hematite mineral was used as a flux by copper smelters. Its distinctive appearance may have helped to attract attention from ancient miners and prospectors. Every once in a while I pull up some Wikipedia article with idle curiosity of "If I were transported back in time, could I usefully help this get invented?" One result of this is a helpless appreciation for how complicated it can be to even identify wha…
Absolutely. As luck would have it, many epithermal mineral deposits have both sparkly hematite and copper ore in the same structure. This is a well-known motif in mineral exploration. They show up in the same geography but are separated into different layers. You can find many papers on the structure of these ore bodies. These are known as supergene deposits[0].
The most important features of these deposits is that they act like distillation columns for metals. Due to weathering and associated sulfuric acid, different metals separate out at different layers of the geology. This creates valuable concentrations for mining purposes.
In modern mining, we kind of ignore these structures for iron mining purposes even though they are frequently > 50% iron by mass. If you find such a thing, you are more interested in the gold, silver, copper potential that is capped by an iron-rich gossan mineral. Iron is a cost sensitive commodity, you need to be able to mine it at very high concentrations and scales to be profitable. If that mineral has a pile of gold, silver, etc distilled underneath it, you’ll be more interested in that.
Not all copper comes from these mineral formations but a lot is. Often, the hematite is mixed in with the copper mineral. I have a mineral exploration prospect right now which is essentially this. Amazing hematite crystals mixed with copper with strong assay signs of gold underneath. It is a predictable motif in mineral exploration.
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#4Note: there have been actual Iron-working sites discovered in India that are older than this, dated to 1600 BC [0]. A lot of this has been ignored (just like the Painted-Grey ware continuity from IVC), partly I imagine, because it calls into question a lot of the racial non-sense that passes for "Indology".
[0]https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/isijinternational/54/5/...
[1]https://www.lkouniv.ac.in/site/writereaddata/siteContent/202...
Edit: Apparently Tamil Nadu state in South India has claimed to have found a site from 3500 BC (not yet peer-reviewed AFAICT),
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#5Note: there have been actual Iron-working sites discovered in India that are older than this, dated to 1600 BC [0]. A lot of this has been ignored (just like the Painted-Grey ware continuity from IVC), partly I imagine, because it calls into question a lot of the racial non-sense that passes for "Indology". [0] https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/isijinternational/54/5/... [1] https://www.lkouniv.ac.in/site/writerea…
nowhere in the article do they claim its the oldest iron...
they just had a theory that copper processing lead to discoveries in iron processing.
the evidence they found seems to support that.
theyre not claiming this particular site is where the iron age started. and it has nothing to do with what some people in india did. Maybe they too discovered iron processing through a similar process. and i dont understand what racial things your bringing up..
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#6Note: there have been actual Iron-working sites discovered in India that are older than this, dated to 1600 BC [0]. A lot of this has been ignored (just like the Painted-Grey ware continuity from IVC), partly I imagine, because it calls into question a lot of the racial non-sense that passes for "Indology". [0] https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/isijinternational/54/5/... [1] https://www.lkouniv.ac.in/site/writerea…
nowhere in the article do they claim its the oldest iron... they just had a theory that copper processing lead to discoveries in iron processing. the evidence they found seems to support that. theyre not claiming this particular site is where the iron age started. and it has nothing to do with what some people in india did. Maybe they too discovered iron processing through a similar process. and i dont understand wha…
This discovery is only of interest because the Iron-Age, as per standard-theory, started around 1200 BC. in the Caucuses/Anatolia or the near-East - which fits with another theory which claims that this allowed the "Aryans" to invade India with their technological superiority around this same time and replace the (dark-skinned) natives genetically.
(Note: the above is obviously a caricature, but current versions of theory don't change the structure, only the emphasis on "race").
No one would care about a copper-smelt site from 500 BC.; nor would they care about this one if the Indian archaeological claims were accepted (but that one also destroys centuries of Western history-making about India, and all the social-theories that depend on it).
This is all a digression from the main claims, so I'd prefer that people don't pull on this thread. For more information on how 'race' was ingested into Indology, I'd refer the interested reader to the excellent book by Adluri/Bagchi [0].
[0] https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article-abstract/120/3/1132/197...
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#7Note: there have been actual Iron-working sites discovered in India that are older than this, dated to 1600 BC [0]. A lot of this has been ignored (just like the Painted-Grey ware continuity from IVC), partly I imagine, because it calls into question a lot of the racial non-sense that passes for "Indology". [0] https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/isijinternational/54/5/... [1] https://www.lkouniv.ac.in/site/writerea…
nowhere in the article do they claim its the oldest iron... they just had a theory that copper processing lead to discoveries in iron processing. the evidence they found seems to support that. theyre not claiming this particular site is where the iron age started. and it has nothing to do with what some people in india did. Maybe they too discovered iron processing through a similar process. and i dont understand wha…
"they just had a theory that copper processing lead to discoveries in iron processing."
Is there any theory how it could have been any different?
It sounds obvious, that advances in metal working comes from those working with metals and not from carpet makers.
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#8> Sparkly hematite mineral was used as a flux by copper smelters. Its distinctive appearance may have helped to attract attention from ancient miners and prospectors. Every once in a while I pull up some Wikipedia article with idle curiosity of "If I were transported back in time, could I usefully help this get invented?" One result of this is a helpless appreciation for how complicated it can be to even identify wha…
Absolutely. As luck would have it, many epithermal mineral deposits have both sparkly hematite and copper ore in the same structure. This is a well-known motif in mineral exploration. They show up in the same geography but are separated into different layers. You can find many papers on the structure of these ore bodies. These are known as supergene deposits[0]. The most important features of these deposits is that t…
> Amazing hematite crystals mixed with copper with strong assay signs of gold underneath.
Any chance we HN rockhounds could get some specimens? 8-)
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#9Fun fact, in the Quran prophet David (Dawwud) was granted a miracle that he can shape and mould iron easily, perhaps for building weaponary and armor.
Another fun fact, there's a surah or chapter name iron (Al-Hadiid) in the Quran [2].
[1] Quran 34:10:
Indeed, We granted David a (great) privilege from Us, (commanding:) “O mountains! Echo his hymns! And the birds as well.” We made iron mouldable for him.
[2] Surah Al-Hadiid (Quran 57):
Re: A 3K-year-old copper smelting site could be key to understanding origins of iron
#10Fun fact, in the Quran prophet David (Dawwud) was granted a miracle that he can shape and mould iron easily, perhaps for building weaponary and armor. Another fun fact, there's a surah or chapter name iron (Al-Hadiid) in the Quran [2]. [1] Quran 34:10: https://quran.com/saba/10 Indeed, We granted David a (great) privilege from Us, (commanding:) “O mountains! Echo his hymns! And the birds as well.” We made iron moulda…
Not sure I see the relevance