All Bronze Age Iron Came From Space, New Study Shows

Popular Mechanics ^ | December 11, 2017 | David Grossman

[C19fan]

Despite the name, there was iron in the Bronze Age. It was just extremely rare. Most famously, the pharaoh Tutankhamun had a headrest, bracelet and dagger made of iron. Other iron artifacts from the same time have also been found around the globe. The existence of these artifacts has led to an archaeological debate: was there, in fact, iron smelting in the Bronze Age?

According to a new chemical analysis, the answer is no. The iron humans had during the Bronze Age came from space.

[tumblindice]

Homer writes about a dispute Odysses resolved.
Two Myrmidons were arguing over an iron spear point.
Both claimed King Agammemnon gave them the ore and forge. and told them to deal with data disribution.

Odysses wisely ruled, “ Whoever smelt it, dealt it.”

[nomorelurker]

This story leaves out “bog iron” a form of iron produced by bacteria in peat bogs, swamps and other marshy places with a naturally occurring source of iron. You could and can find it in small nodules up to golf ball size. Did not need to be smelted just melted. Secret weapon of the Vikings. Had a high Silica content (glass) content so nails made from it did not corrode so bad once the outer iron layer went away. Bring your longship upon to the beach burn it recover nails cut new timber and build new ship. Worked for them maybe thousand years.

[AdmSmith]

• There has been a controversy about the origin of Bronze Age irons that could be either meteoritic or smelted irons.

• A geochemical approach using Fe:Co:Ni analyses, permits to differentiate terrestrial from extraterrestrial irons.

• Meteoritic irons, Bronze Age iron artifacts, ancient terrestrial irons and lateritic ores enable to validate this approach.

• Modern irons and iron ores are shown to exhibit a different relationship in a Fe:Co:Ni array.

• Iron from the Bronze Age are meteoritic, invalidating speculations about precocious smelting during the Bronze Age

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440317301322

[AdmSmith]

If you have a chunk of metal or a rock that contains metal and the metal contains >4% nickel (Ni), then it is probably a meteorite. If the metal contains >0.02% chromium (Cr) or manganese (Mn), then it is not a meteorite, however.

If the metal contains <4% nickel, then the metal chunk or rock is not a meteorite.

If you have a rock that contains between 1.0 and 1.8% nickel (whole-rock analysis), whether or not it appears to contain metal, then the rock might be a meteorite.

If you have a rock that does NOT contain metal and has a low concentration of nickel (<1% = <10000 ppm), it could still be a rare type of meteorite, an achondrite. (About 5% of stony meteorites are achondrites. The probability is exceedingly small, however, because nearly all (guesstimate: >99.999%) Earth rocks have the same properties - no iron-nickel metal and low concentrations of nickel (<0.3%)

http://meteorites.wustl.edu/id/metal4.htm

[mad_as_he$$]

+1,,,,,lol.

[AdmSmith]

Some good (and not so good) comments here https://science.slashdot.org/story/17/12/08/0136216/almost-all-bronze-age-artifacts-were-made-from-meteorite-iron

[dennisw]

Interesting on bog iron! Just read the wiki on it.

[RegulatorCountry]

I guess the engine block of the 455 in my old GMC motorhome is from outer space then, whoda thunk lol?