Fun article. I think that there is a lot of interesting information here that would help explain what we saw with the Bronze Age Collapse, though I would submit that this is just another of the multiple factors that led to the collapse. Maybe a drought occurs, folks turn to iron weapons, and then take over another town or village for their resources, and so on.
This could lead to supply chain collapses and such. Maybe just general destabilization and raids and such sort of collapsed the larger empires. But at the same time, those larger empires would also have had access to iron, so why couldn't they by matter of numerical superiority, access to greater resources, tactics and military organization, and more simply, overwhelm smaller armies or bands utilizing the same technology and restore order or at least defend themselves?
I just started reading Conrad Black's historical series and in the Egyptian chapter and also the Assyria/Babylonia chapter he references the historical accounts where time and time again Egyptian forces led by the pharaoh would march into the broader Middle East to restore order. Why couldn't they continue to do that?
Because pure iron, with no carbonization, is useless as a material for tools or weapons.
Carbonization was invented/discovered after the Bronze Age collapse, slowly over hundreds of years, exactly because they didn’t have access to bronze anymore.
Despite being "useless", almost all early iron age weapons were iron, not steel nor bronze. They generally knew about steel, but could not control the carbonization well enough to outfit the whole army with it. Steel did not become widespread until the Roman era.
ericmay · · focus · HN ↗
This could lead to supply chain collapses and such. Maybe just general destabilization and raids and such sort of collapsed the larger empires. But at the same time, those larger empires would also have had access to iron, so why couldn't they by matter of numerical superiority, access to greater resources, tactics and military organization, and more simply, overwhelm smaller armies or bands utilizing the same technology and restore order or at least defend themselves?
I just started reading Conrad Black's historical series and in the Egyptian chapter and also the Assyria/Babylonia chapter he references the historical accounts where time and time again Egyptian forces led by the pharaoh would march into the broader Middle East to restore order. Why couldn't they continue to do that?
noncoml · · focus · HN ↗
Carbonization was invented/discovered after the Bronze Age collapse, slowly over hundreds of years, exactly because they didn’t have access to bronze anymore.
bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
noncoml · · focus · HN ↗
Also you are talking about Iron Age. Which came after and as a consequence of the Bronze Age.
Pure iron is utterly useless as a weapon. Look it up.
bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗