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Tom King
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 Posted: Tue 29 May, 2018 6:48 pm Post subject: |
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One thing I don't think has been brought up yet
1.Bronze is cast
2. You can cast bronze at far lower temperatures than it takes to work iron/steel, let alone smelt it.
It is much easier to work bronze into complex shapes like helmets, chest plates, greaves, etc. The complexity of a Bronze age helmet versus an iron age helmet as far a organic shape, overall coverage, and complexity of form can be at least partially attributed to the fact that casting then grinding a corinthian helm you carved from wax is a hell of a lot easier than trying to make the same thing out of iron.
Forges and forging methods were the main limiting factor. It took the better part of 2000 years before the same complexity and things like "Heroic armor" started to reappear.
https://books.google.com/books?id=PteVlrlhy9YC&printsec=frontcover&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false
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Dan Howard
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| Posted: Tue 29 May, 2018 10:03 pm Post subject: |
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| Tom King wrote: | | The complexity of a Bronze age helmet versus an iron age helmet as far a organic shape, overall coverage, and complexity of form can be at least partially attributed to the fact that casting then grinding a corinthian helm you carved from wax is a hell of a lot easier than trying to make the same thing out of iron. |
Bronze helmets were not cast and ground. They were raised from flat plate just like iron ones. The main difference is the annealing process.
Author: Bronze Age Military Equipment, Pen and Sword Books
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Matthew Amt
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| Posted: Wed 30 May, 2018 6:48 am Post subject: |
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| Tom King wrote: | One thing I don't think has been brought up yet
1.Bronze is cast |
Sure, but bronze sheet items were also common, hammered out from thin cast plates.
| Quote: | | 2. You can cast bronze at far lower temperatures than it takes to work iron/steel, let alone smelt it. |
Copper melts at 1084.62 °C, 1984.32 °F, while the smelting point of iron is about 1250 °C or 2282 °F. So it's only a difference of about 200 degrees. And we know that ancient bloomeries could reach the *melting* point of iron, far higher than its smelting temperature, so generating the needed heat does not seem to have been a problem.
| Quote: | | It is much easier to work bronze into complex shapes like helmets, chest plates, greaves, etc. The complexity of a Bronze age helmet versus an iron age helmet as far a organic shape, overall coverage, and complexity of form can be at least partially attributed to the fact that casting then grinding a corinthian helm you carved from wax is a hell of a lot easier than trying to make the same thing out of iron. |
As Dan has said, bronze helmets and armor were not cast, but hammered out of sheet or thin plate (which was initially cast, yes!). We're still arguing about what sort of "blank" might have been cast for items like the Corinthian helmet, but it's pretty clear that the ancients had no qualms about adding cast-on features such as crest knobs and nasal reinforcements to thin hammered bronze items.
Plus, the warriors of the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age didn't care about costs! They were RICH, and wanted to show it off. How many millionaires shop around for a cheaper Maserati? High cost was a *benefit*, not a problem.
Well, basically true. The steel artwork of Negroli and other late medieval and Renaissance masters isn't really an issue, here. We do find iron weapons becoming common several centuries before iron armor, apparently because it was difficult to work iron out thin enough for armor. It has to be forged hot, and thinner metal loses heat too quickly. Bronze, on the other hand, has to be hammered while cold, with frequent annealings to prevent cracking. It just took a while to work out the tricks.
Matthew
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