m/m -

A fairly recent "historyical revision" holds that the end of the "bronze age" and transition to the "iron age" was not because iron is a better material than bronze. With the materials and processing capabilities of the time of the transition, bronze was in fact a much superior material, and remained so until very modern times.

Bronze, even of that time, doesn't rust. Iron and even much later mild steel rusts quickly and even modern "high carbon" steels of many kinds are prone to short life.

Bronze can be "hardened" simply by hammering at room temperature, and reaches hardness levels unattainable by the simple irons of early times, which must be heated to high temperatures to be hammmered without cracking, quenched to be hardened, and then tempered to avoid being extremely brittle.

The simplistic explanation is simply that "they ran out of bronze" and were forced to substitute an inferior material.

The real explanation is that political disruptions made bronze inaccessible to most of the world population of that time, and a "cheap substitute" had to be developed. Eventually the substitute was worked into something fairly useful, but it did take quite a while.

Anyone who doubts what can be achieved in terms of strength and hardness with bronze might like to try cutting a scrap off a modern cymbal. My son had one that developed a few small cracks (after a lot of abuse), and I thought that drilling a few "stop" holes to prevent the cracks from growing might be a good idea. After burning the entire cutting end off of about three tungsten carbide (the best available) bits, I gave it up without ever making a complete hole.

For incredibly sharp tools, I'm told that freshly knapped flint is superior to any modern steel. One surgeon who actually tested using "flint scalpels" (made for him by a friend who was a "re-enactor") was so impressed he attempted to learn how to make them, but conceded he'd never be able to learn the stone age skill needed to make them consitently.

John