The riddle of steel: How people made it by accident for millennia
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- čas přidán 22. 02. 2018
- Did you know people were making steel for swords and jewelry thousands of years before they knew how?
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What quenching and tempering does to swords: • What quenching and tem...
Oldest STEEL sword in the world: • The oldest STEEL sword...
Yes, the archaeological record from the beginning of the Iron Age through to the introduction of crucible steels shows this clearly. It is particularly evident in the production of nails, digs have produced finds where nails were clearly made by one person but showed variation between relatively soft iron through to quite good carbon steel.
Optionsaregood iii
Optionsaregood ...makes sense. I can imagine making workable wire would have been an early starting point.
Never was such "ages". We have always known how to work wood, clay and metal.
Genesis Ch. 4: 22.
And this is why there is a bottleneck;
Genesis Ch. 5.
@@GeneralPadron GTFO, creationist idiot.
@@lukemills237 woah... woooahh.... i wonder who is the true idiot. He just said his beliefs.
Interesting side note on "whatever word they used for steel": Apparently in germany they just called "good iron"
If there's one things Germans love, it's shoving words together.
This is a flammenwerfer. It werfs flammens.
This is a koenigstiger. it is a koenig amongst tigers.
This is a schwimmwagen. it is a wagen that schwimms.
my favorite comes from a fantasy book i forgot the title of "BrightIron"
@@morganrobinson8042well, one could almost call that "Worteaneinanderhängenliebe", if one were so inclined ^^
PixelMaster What does it mean tho
Put in your RPGs this "magical smith" who makes a "magical weapons", who acctually just makes steel stuff insted of regular iron stuff :D
Or, better yet, makes armour out of titanium. Almost as strong as steel, significantly lighter, allowing for higher armour thickness for a given weight.
The trouble is that titanium is significantly harder to create than steel. Simply heating titanium ore is inadequate to reduce it to titanium metal. Metallic titanium is little over a century old. To produce titanium metal, you need chlorine gas to convert the ore to titanium tetrachloride, then alkali or alkali earth metals (which are also challenging to produce) to reduce that into metallic titanium. Your 'magical' blacksmith would have to be a legendary alchemist as well to produce titanium.
One can even say that smithing titanium is a bit like the riddle of steel of today - quite a rare know-how, well-guarded by those who master it.
BBomb1234 damn if it's that difficult to smelt titanium I hate to imagine the process involved in making armor out of dragon hide
@@BBomb1234 so yeah man titanium armor is magic af
"Steel isn't strong, boy! Flesh is stronger! [...] What is Steel compared to the hand that wields it?"
_Thulsa Doom, Conan the Barbarian._
Jovan Mitrić, you killed my mother, you killed my father, you took my father's sword.
Your argument is invalid.
~T800
*steel beam falls on you, killing you instantly*
"When I die, Crom will ask me the riddle of steel. And if I cannot answer him, he will throw me out of Valhalla." From "Conan the Barbarian"
I thought of the movie, too, when I saw the title, because Riddle of Steel is the part part of the soundtrack.
Backwoodsbrooks Knives, Crom, I never prayed to you before, I have no tongue for it.
People talk of magical swords but think about it. Back then if someone knew the secret and made a sword like no other, people might just attribute it's properties as being magic.
Arthur C. Clarkes 3rd Law comes to mind. "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
There's actually a Terry Prachett quote that comes to mind "What about a really old sword of kings, y'know from before people knew about magic, when a sword of Kings was just a sword that was really bloody good at cutting things?"
Eric Davidson This is possibly part of the origin of the Excaliur myths and legends.
BusterXXXL Yes... think of electric lights. You walk into a dark room, touch the wall... POOF!! LIGHT!! We know how it comes through the wires, how the switch works; but back then...
How many people, making some first-time discovery, were revered as wizards, or even gods... or tortured and executed as witches and demons?
The first metal tools would have looked like magic.
This isn't just applicable to steel - this is the formation of humanity.
Early agriculture would have worked with the same guesswork, as would textile production, leather production, gathering foodstuffs - the list is endless.
Everything must have begun with a leap of faith, of sorts.
Cleary there have been great leaps in thought, where a process of understanding would lead to greater developments, but the 'magic of steel' is the 'magic of humanity'.
IMHO (or at least in my limited understanding).
Edit: I forgot to say - great video Shad - excellent content.
Humanity, fuck yeah.
SHAD! My dad opened the dictionary to look up "Magpie," and as he was skimming through to get there, I saw a picture and definition of a Machicolation. I officially declare this day: not wasted.
MACHICOLATIONSSS!!!
Shad! My dad?
Shad Fact: Skallgarim and Shad once sparred for 3 days straight without rest food or water, this is how Kings Canyon was formed.
THIS COMMENT!!!!! YES MAN!
The earth beneath their feet gave way to their fury.
The powers of Pommels, Dragons and Machicolations, what a terrifying battle that must have been.
The battle raged for three days and seven nights. The clash could be heard all the way to the Arby's down the street.
Shad hearted this comment.
This is now official lore.
If I ever finish developing my Medieval game, I will add Shad Explanations, and Mashicoolations!!!
Is it done
@@wanderingRebel69 sadly no
@@pablolongobardi7240 does this medieval game have a name?
The first guy who accidentally discovered steel actually made loads of money, leading to the phrase ‘whoever smelt it dealt it.’
James Tickle BOOOOOOOOO!! x-D
Lol, well played!
@nickyiil Actually, he would have gone to a priest and got the blessings from the gods, as well as a contract for his work by the priest-king to make him jewelry and/or weapons.
His name was Tubalcain,
Genesis Ch. 4: 22.
@nickyiil , We have plenty of written records. The Holy Scriptures.
I suspect that it is conditions such as this that helped the popularity of myths and legends of magic swords.
Fire and wind come from the sky, from the gods of the sky, but Crom is your god. Crom, and he lives in the earth. Once giants lived in the earth, Conan, and in the darkness of chaos they fooled Crom, and they took from him the enigma of steel. Crom was angered, and the earth shook, and fire and wind struck down these giants, and threw their bodies into the waters. But in their rage, the gods forgot the secret of steel, and left it on the battlefield. We, who found it, are just men: not gods, not giants, just men. And the secret of steel has always carried with it a mystery. You must learn its riddle, Conan, you must learn its discipline. For no one, no one in this world can you trust. Not men, not women, not beasts... This you can trust. [points to his sword]
Perfect!
Tadicuslegion78, steel isn't strong boy, flesh, flesh is stronger, for what is steel without the hand that wields it?
Tadicuslegion78 reference?
Conan, what is best in life?!
bill seemore
What is the hand, compared to the will that drives it?
I actually have been working on an iron/ bronze/ stone age fantasy universe for rpg purposes for a couple of weeks now. Where steel is an ancient secret of the long gone dwarven folk. This was a very informative video on the riddle of steel. Thank you!
pikku mikko What a coincidence.. I'm making a video game that needs depth to it's story.
Whoever discovered the process could have made a fortune with a patent, since everyone tried to STEEL his idea.
Mermaid Man either the king or an appointed official
Mermaid Man patents and A: any new discovery would have been taken before the king because unlike modern blacksmiths the ones of old were also in charge of supplying the army with weapons and the king was in charge of the army they wouldn't have kept such a thing from the king for fear of being accused of treason and exiled or killed and B: I have been in front of enough noblemen and women to know that their word is law
Mermaid Man this is actually kind of redundant because I doubt patent laws existed before the Industrial Age also all of that dangerous and tedious travel would have been worth it to get the kings blessing and endorsement also the smith who discovered steel would not have taught it to just anyone he would have taught his son how to do it (considering how unlike today people tended to follow in the footsteps of their fathers) plus I realize he would not have gone straight to the king with it he would have given himself some time to make sure it wasn't a fluke or a one off incident when he was confident that it was something new then he would go before the king
Mermaid Man nothing ventured nothing gained besides you did gain something an audience with the king so even if he is not interested merchants certainly will be remember in the days of old meeting royalty wasn't something regarded with mild interest it was a big deal for the lucky few granted the privilege
That's why patent law kickstarted the industrial revolution, because then people who discovered new things didn't need to jealously guard the secret to prevent anyone else learning how to do it. You can't start a factory to mass-produce anything under those circumstances.
The real riddle of steel. Your flesh many grow weak, Your steel may grow brittle, But your will is indomitable.
"Steel isn't strong boy, flesh is much stronger, for what is the power of steel compared to the strength of the hand that wields it"
But you can't trust men, women or beast. But steel you can trust.
Wise words sir, Wise words indeed.
Dragon50275, but then what is best in life?
Dragon50275, yes, that is good!
"the riddle of steel" sounds like a power metal song.🤘
Shad, to find more inspiration for the magic steel trope, you should definitely research superstitions regarding smiths by looking into ethnology and folklore studies. My favorite source probably wouldn't help you that much as "Das Handwörterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens" is only available in a bit outdated German, but I guess comparable tomes exist in English and with regards to anglosaxon folklore.
It is sometimes just amazing to browse subjects. The subjects "smith" "metalworking" and "iron" each fill up several pages, showing how early metalworkers were regarded as powerful, dangerous and highly suspicious people, practicing a hermetic art, possibly in collusion with demons from the underworld, from where they dug up their source materials.
It also seems that early smiths tended to be a nomadic bunch, as little mining technology was available, so they wandered off once they cleared an area from surface finds.
BusterXXXL Wonder if that's where we get the myth of dwarves being nomadic metalworkers
If you're looking for some further reading on folklore and deities tied to metalwork, you might want to give "Blacksmith Gods: Myths, Magicians & Folklore by Pete Jennings" a shot :)
Amanda Saint dwarves live in the mines the only nomadic dwarfs are the ones that are travelling merchants looking to sell their wares or mercenaries looking to sell their axe hand dwarves might be a little on the short side but they have enough strength to cleave a man’s head in two with a single swing
On the fiction front, I remembered an old Hong Kong period piece about an king in the warring state period (300BC) absolutely obsessed with swords would collect and hire smith to forge the best bronze and iron swords. He eventually became a tyrant (I think is GoJian the same dude in one of Metatron's video). One day he stopped a traveling smith holding a metal rod and demand to examine it. The smith's rod which look like a cheeto cut right through his awesome sword and manage to get away in the confusion. He then become obsessed with the XuanTie(Mystery Iron) which is prob steel. Movie wasn't that good, but it was pretty interesting on that front.
It would be great if you could ralley your fan base to get man at arms to make the Vared Jericho sword. I've tried requesting it every time since you brought it up but never get enough support. I think they could do a great job and it would be awesome to see what it looked like for real.
This just shows how much of a "blackbox" much of medieval tech was. You see this with an awful lot of things, primarily in medicine and metalurgy, where they only really figured it out with an insane amount of experimentation. And even then, they may know that X+Y=Z, but they don't know the why of it.
I encounter this phenomenon time and time again in software development.
Always been that way. We used fire for thousands of years before understanding the chemical processes that cause it to work, and electricity was discovered long before we knew what electrons were. We _still_ don't really understand how electrons actually work on a quantum mechanics level.
As a member of a blacksmtihing group i approve this video excellent for the general concept of steel! Also i commented on sword construction in another video and after seeing this maybe you could make a series about this and quenching/heat treating and finally the components/assembly of swords. Thnx for the great content Shad!
P.S. there is an awesome documentary about the Ulfberht (idk exact spelling) swords in which a modern blacksmith creates his own crucible steel to make a replica sword. It was on netflix a while back (Secrets of the Viking Sword) and the mystery is how these "vikings" made these swords considering the bloomery steel of the time was of noticeably inferior steel.
I saw that documentary of the " Ulfberht " . I really enjoyed it myself. Especially using the *bones of your enemies* as a component of the steel, giving it it's "magical" abilities like springiness and how it holds it's edge. (the bone actually burning into the carbon used to make the iron into steel)
Good video, something I think would be useful to point out in a future video is that the difficulty in making steel is finding the sweet spot of carbon content. Too little you’re left with wrought iron and too much you actually get cast iron. So the difficulty may not have been figuring out how to make something hard by adding carbon, but being able to identify the sweet spot between soft and hard so it could still be tough but not brittle like cast iron.
I always thought that early iron use was all cast iron with naturally high carbon content, and the trick to steel making was to get that carbon out, but not all the way out. Always nice to learn something new.
Nicolas de Spada I didn't know the difference between wrought iron and cast iron... now I do, thanks.
@@SmithDrewSmith I read somewhere that a typical method for making steel in the medieval period was to introduce carbon to wrought iron. This was done by folding wrought iron with a certain amount of pig iron.
Well, learn something new every day. I did not know they used steel in Jewelry. You, sir, as a scholar and a gentleman. glad to be subbed to you.
Jeremy Stone Agreed. I'm learning things I never even thought about before... some things, I wonder: now why does this even interest me? - but it does...
Always love getting my historic misconceotions shattered and going "wow that actually makes much sense"...
Excellent introductory video! You, of course, do realize that now you must continue further in the whole topic of metallurgy, or at least steel metallurgy through history? ;)
I always assumed Europeans were already making steel with a crucible when Japan was still doing bloomery steel. and this made me interested and started doing some of my own research. India and the middle east might have been using crucibles as early as 900 A.D (most likely for copper, bronze and iron). some of the earliest Blast furnaces were in Switzerland and Germany 1100 I believe. Its all so interesting. based on this I would still assumed Europe had better quality steel then other areas of the world. its still so impressive how much Japan improved their steel by folding, it might not be quite the same but damn impressive.
There are some pieces of ancient literature that suggest steel started around that area. Egypt, Eastern Europe, Middle East, India. After all, those places were better at working iron than the rest of the world. I mean, the Romans were pretty good at working steel. Not iron, steel.
Tyler Carhart I think Japanese swords are built more for aesthetic than the kind of brutal violence you would find in a medieval European conflict after all a European sword is just a lump of steel/iron with a bit of leather wrapped around the grip Japanese swords on the other hand are handcrafted to have intricate symbols such as the mark of the clan that commissioned the sword and other aesthetics
dion jay woollaston
Im pretty sure all weapons back then were hand crafted. And the katana is also "just a lump of steel".
Agent. ( -_-) yes I know that it’s a lump of steel that took months to forge compared to European swords because more often than not they were custom jobs like the swords forged on man at arms
@@dionjaywoollaston1349 Almost every sword back then was a custom job, lmao. You're clearly ignorant on the fantastic craftsmanship and quality shown in European swords, easily equal to if not greater than Japanese ones.
Stop bein' a weeb.
Goodness. Where were you when I needed to do historical social studies school work in the 90's and early 2000's? lol.
He was probably learning all this stuff the old fashioned way ;)
The add placement gave me a second to think about why a red haired something would be used to make steel. Did not expect boys urinating on it.
Just wanna post early so I can say thanks again Shad, it legit makes my day better to learn something new from you. Keep up the good work dude, you make good work!
WITNESSED! Love ya shad!
My fiancé and I were literally talking about this last night. That's a bit odd, the timing of the upload and the conversation that is. Still awesome.
Exactly what i was thinking lmao.
Actually yes, I was wondering how steel was made, what kind of metal it was. Since, I couldn't remember if it was a combination of metals, aka by product, or if it was its own thing that someone could mine.
Riddle me this,riddle me that
Who would thought steel can be made flat?
Thanks to you,Shad,
My hat's off for you,mi lad!
Fire and wind come from the sky, from the gods of the sky, but Crom is your god. Crom, and he lives in the earth. Once giants lived in the earth, Conan, and in the darkness of chaos they fooled Crom, and they took from him the enigma of steel. Crom was angered, and the earth shook, and fire and wind struck down these giants, and threw their bodies into the waters. But in their rage, the gods forgot the secret of steel, and left it on the battlefield. We, who found it, are just men: not gods, not giants, just men. And the secret of steel has always carried with it a mystery. You must learn its riddle, Conan, you must learn its discipline. For no one, no one in this world can you trust. Not men, not women, not beasts... This you can trust. [points to his sword].
Well, there is a little problem in your explanation. Steel varies from 0 to 2.08% of carbon, but below 0.2-0.3 you can't heat-treat the steel. It will remain soft, no matter what you do. Of course, if you heat it in a coal fire it will absorb some carbon into the outer layers and will therefore will become harder if you quench it.
Below 0.2% your steel will mostly be softer then your cast-iron with much more carbon, but the steel is a lot tougher and more flexible.
Greetings from a student of an European university for mining and metallurgy
The first iron weapons were made during the bronze age out of meteorite iron.
Even during the iron age, it could give you the edge (pun not intended) over your competitors to have access to meteorite iron, as the Romans did.
AFAIK, the ferrum norricum came all from a giant meteor that devastated a huge area at a time where Rome was still small.
Fascinating video, Shad! I always learn something.
I always suspected this but you offered a very clear and in-depth explanation. Thanks mate!
P.S. I really like how you frame your pictures!
This video needed more Conan soundtrack
The history of steel is interesting, but WHAT ABOUT THE DRAGON MACHICOLATIONS MADE OF STEEL????
Mother of God
Iron Age fantasy with steel as adamantine? Sounds potentially interesting. The question is, would it be a low fantasy setting (not much blatant magic, largely historical), or would it be a high fantasy setting (lots of magic, potentially-interesting societal divergences)?
I think a low fantasy setting suits best, but that's just me.
I agree, low fantasy.
Somewhere in the middle
Im building a game right now thats a middle ground of the two. Check it out!
Shadiversity
Any day you want to do an rpg like this count me in 😊........... please 🙏
honestly, i wish this video was called "the secret of steel" as a reference to the Conan movies, but great work nonetheless Shad
Thanks, I made this point on your oldest steel sword video.
I assume we can thank the Dragons for melting the iron for the early people.
Also Shad there’s a channel call Primitive Technology that I think you’d find very interesting.
Love me some Primitive Technology videos
Shadiversity awesome! That channel is amazing, the guy says nothing outside of captions and has millions of people watching.
Riddles are cool BUT WHAT ABOUT DRAGONS??!
I've heard that a lot of discoveries were first made by accident.
About the jewellery thing... that's something I wouldn't have thought of before; but now it does make some sense. I'm far from an expert or historian but here are some thoughts that occur to me:
We use gold and silver because they're rare; but back then steel was also rare.
We use gold and silver because they are easy to work and detail; steel would be much more difficult; but, back then, they may have valued it for jewelry for just that reason. Because it was so hard and took more and longer work, it might bring more prestige to the jeweler - and to the rare person who could afford the price of something so hard to make, simply for decoration.
Might I be right, or am I completely wrong? I'd like to know your own opinion on this line of thought.
That makes perfect sense and I imagine that over time they figured that steel was better suited for use in tools, weapons, and armor than jewelry.
Good stuff
Precious metal was a storage system for wealth before there were banks. If a disaster happens you can forge that steel bracelet into something useful or sell it for food.
don't forget about the aestetic value. Steel is a silvery metal with very shiny surface, that is very hard to scratch. bronze, copper and silver develop patina very quickly compared to steel. It is also next to impossible to melt, so it is harder to re-sell stolen goods - you can't simply melt it and make other stuff out of it, like is the case of gold.
KohuGaly Good point about the difficulty of melting and reselling. I didn't think of that.
Great vid. I love your metallurgy videos.
Awesome video as always, Shad!
But I'm disappointed by the lack of Conan the Barbarian reference.
Very interesting shad.
Entertaining as always. Keep doing your great job!
Cruicible steel was indeed developed later... EXCEPT for wootz steel (later called Damascus, where it was imported from India and then exported to Europe and middle east), which was actual cruicible steel (molten to full liquid) even before Christ.
Another problem is how you define steel and iron. Chemically pure iron is pretty much impossible to find in nature. Then metalurgically, steel is any iron alloy with carbon content between 0.002% and 2.14%. Above that, to make things even more confusing, it's called cast iron :P Pretty much all of what was called iron in the past (wrought iron for example), would be considered steel by today's standards. And then archaeology has an even more obscure and different definition, calling most objects from before 13th Century iron, and after that - steel.
Yet another important fact - the discovery of steel and its difference from iron was done pretty early. But it wasn't a jump from iron to steel tools and weapons. For centuries, pretty much from 0 AD to the industrial revolution the most common way of making tools was to make the tool out of softer iron (that is much easier to forge, and forge weld) and use hard steel for the working surface or the blade. They quickly found out that you can make steel out of iron by forging charcoal dust into it, and then folding and welding until it's evenly distributed. But since it was laborous carbon steel was much more valuable, so only as late as 13th Century (when spanish steel, made from purer iron ore from mines took the place of bog ore used before) they started producing weapons, particularly good quality swords out of monosteel.
And it get's even more confusing with the stupid modern definition of wrought iron as iron with a carbon content below 0.005%, which from an historical point of view is complete bullcrap.
For which information exactly?
Wootz steel also had vandium in it, which came from the specific mines in india. Vandium lines up carbon in the way that is now imitated by pattern welded steel.
I don't know if it was melted to "full liquid" or if it was two pattern of steel strongly welded together in a crucible...
TrollDragomir really I thought they used sulfur to turn iron into steel
Never really thought about that... interesting, I might have to keep that in mind when I try to write...
Perhaps we should quench steel blades in the urine of red heads? When in Rome, after all...
@PhillipMargrave using blood in the forging process was actually done, but by the vikings
@@lunardarkangel5237 Did it affect anything?
@@lunardarkangel5237 Gonna need a source on that, pal
*Is a red-head*
Darn you, Shad... I just got in trouble for urinating into the iron pots and pans... :/ Oh well... I was gonna do it anyway, I suppose.
I wonder if that was a distraction by some guy who knew something, but he used that tale to mislead the others, so he could have the monopoly on good stuff/more money!
Very exciting! I always pondered on that question! Thanks in advance! :)
Never disappointed with your videos Shad. Keep it up!
Amazing work as always Shad!!
Awesome video Shad!
wow shad that was very interesting, having looked into steel production I had though a bloom was a bloom and that was steel but to realise that it was only a small random portion of the bloom that was steel makes the iron age allot more interesting.
Wow wow wow, excellent topic and excellent discussion! You could probably make a whole series just on this topic.
That answer so many questions that I've always had. Well done Pof. Shad. Thank you.
Thanks for the video Shad, I actually made a comment on your tempering video at how it amazed me at the trial and error it would have taken to figure out with thier level and understanding of science.
I just wanted to say thank you :) I found you in a time where I was really struggling with my history studies at university. I was almost at the point of giving it up but your passion for the subjects in your videos managed to remind me why I studied in the first place. Thank you ❤
That's awesome to hear mate and thank you. I hope your studies go well.
Shadiversity it's going a lot better, thanks :)
Hi Shad! First, I'd like to thank you for making this video. It's very interesting getting to learn about these tidbits of history. And second, I am TOTALLY going to use this mystery of steel in the fantasy story I'm writing.
Simple overview: an average chemistry major student from our world gets sucked into a medevial world that has magic in it and tries to find a way back while learning magic and trying to stop a civil war from breaking out. And one of the main ideas I want to explore in this world is how his knowledge of science and technology affects it.
I'd actually love to get your feedback on it when I get more of it flushed out, if you'd be open to that. But in the mean time, thank you for the information and inspiration.
You don't melt ore in a crucible. To get the metal out of ore it has to be reduced, which was done with carbon like charcoal or coke. What can be done is producing high carbon iron (which is easier to smelt), and then burning the carbon out of it in a crucible.
Excellent video! Loved listening to you talk about this.
The lengths an Australian will go to say "bloom" as many times as possible continue to impress
This is fascinating, thank you!
Informative and explained in a way easy to understand. Pretty interesting vid. Thanks for the post.
Loving the facial hair shad! Keep up the great videos
Thats one of your best videos shad! Like it when you make travels back in time in your mind
Great video, very enjoyable and thought provoking. I've always been fascinated by smelting and forging.
I would imagine recycling makes it fairly tough for archaeologists to pin down dates on metallurgical advancements. Since most things made with metals will eventually be smelted back down to be reforged into something new. We basically have to hope for things to be buried with people, passed down as cherished heirlooms, or become lost/misplaced to avoid the phoenix cycle that most metals eventually undergo.
Very cool topic that I knew little about. This is why i love this channel!!
A quenching hypothesis: Customer pays extra for a good quality blade with a bonus for quickness of crafting. The smith, knowing that water cools things, holds the hot steel blade in a horse or livestock water trough (were they using troughs that far back?) to cool it quicker and during working/sharpening it after cooling the smith notices that it has gotten more resistant to his strikes than if he'd just let it cool normally.
While the game doesn’t go into much detail on just how the various factions developed the use of certain metals, Tyranny is an excellent example in a video game of an ancient “arms race”. There is one faction that use iron quite regularly for their armor and weapons while keeping everyone else, who still uses bronze, in the dark about it. It’s a pleasant change of pace compared to the usual RPGs.
Great video, Shad. This was actually something that I was thinking about the other day. I always wonder about how we, as humans, came about to creating certain things, I especially wonder about this when it comes to food. I've always wondered how early humans learned that some things were worth the effort of figuring that they were good to eat. Certain things like cows, pigs, goats, etc. are obvious but I always wonder about things like lobsters, shrimps, crabs and the like (basically giant bugs in the ocean), what prompted someone to go through the effort of not only figuring if they were edible but how to cook them.
Yes, it is always interesting how an invention has come to the ancient people when they did not see a trace of the final result until all steps are taken. Like with smelting: you have to gather specific rocks, clean them, heat them up to ungodly temperature and gather liquids that would flow from them...
Riceball01 if you are poor and hungry enough, you'll eat anything even something that looks like a giant bug you dredged up from the sea.
A lot of discoveries in human history come down to serendipity.
I’ve always had the same thought regarding mushrooms.
Fat Tiger I suppose you have a point.
Riceball01 I wonder how long people took to selectively breed, (or even think of the same) certain foods - like meatier, fatter chickens, or today's corn and wheat from their originals with smaller, fewer seeds. Today we take this original genetic mod. for granted... but who first thought of it?
Clearly steel was invented to make pommels but they weren't powerful enough so people made swords to screw them off of. Then people started using the swords instead of the pommels.
Enough with the stupid fucking pommel meme, its not clever, its plebeian as fuck, with all the fucking me too idiots.
*Throws pommel*
Looks like someone has been ended rightly one too many times.
Sorry but that is not a pommel, it's a Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch, with a blade attached. OK, I'm not going to argue with it...
+SeriousThree But those 2 things ARE the same thing
Always wondered who thought what happens if I heat this rock up...
And as always a very thought inducing video
I adore this video. It delivers a masters level lesson in the history of steel and does such a good job of capturing the mystery behind the discovery of steel through the ages.
It’s a CZcams gem!
Thank you for posting this helpful video!
allways fun to see someone, who havent done it, talk about getting iron out of a bog
That was a cool little journey of thought to travel on. Thank you.
Doom! Doom! Thulsa Doom! Seeks the secret of steel. Now that is off my chest, I vaguely recall reading of a type of Chinese foundry where they built the stack going up a hill, with multiple furnaces positioned along it. Apparently the top of the stack was quite warm because of this construction. This may have enabled them to melt iron and make crucible steel.
Swear I subbed to you a year ago!?!? Love ya work. This topic is my jam as they say lol
Great video, thank you!
Impurities in coal also strengthen or weaken the making of steel.
German goblin silver, " Cobalt " added strength and a blueish hue to steel. Other than glass making, cobalt was a wast metal in mining .
In a few mini series on the life of Attila the Hun, it is mention that the Hun tribes would war with each other over the control of tree copes that they made their bows from. You can make a good bow in under a week, but it takes 12 to 20 years for a tree to grow strong enough to make a proper bow.
So in a campaign setting you can have baronies warring over forests for bow wood and ship building, also for coal mines to make the best steel from.
You've given me an excellent idea. I have this idea for a DnD campaign that involves a tribe of one of the standard barbarian mook species (goblinoids/orcs/etc) finding a way to significantly improve their technology level making them suddenly a much more dangerous threat. I had the vague idea of them capturing a dwarf smith or something, who would then be compelled to teach them the secrets of his craft, whatever those might be.
Now, if I have the primatives largely using basic iron technology, with steel being reserved for the blades of their greatest champions and the like, and suddenly they're taught how to turn iron into steel in such quantities that they can outfit themselves entirely in steel equipment, they'll be a much bigger threat while actually maintaining realism.
I really enjoy all your videos, and this was an interesting topic. But i really want you to cover more writing novels/manuscripts
very interesting
Steel isn't strong Shad. *Machicolations* are Stronger!
Shad: “What do you make precious materials out of?”
Me: “What about dragons?”
Legend has it that a famous smith made a sword and wasn't happy with it (too bendy/soft) and ground it up and mixed it into his food for the chicken. Then he collected the chicken poop and used it instead of iron ore and made a legendary sword out of it...
edi that was Wieland the Smith if I remember right, and I remember that he fed it to geese multiple times
Sounds like chicken shit to me
Early steel sword coresponds briliantly with those epics like King Arthur, Nibelungs aor Roland. Where kings and heroes have these almost magical swords. It's simply insanly expensive steel sword in times where all the others used iron ones.
excellent shot of Ilya in there to introduce quenching :)
No wonder alchemists believed in transmutation. You could take worthless red rocks and transmute them into a valuable black iron tool or weapon, and if you were a very skilled wizard, you could make precious gleaming steel. Why not gold?
Is this the reason why damascus steel earned the reputation for being high quality? Since they folded the steel over itself over and over must've meant that the piece spent more time in the forge in direct contact with the burning charcoal and thus got infused with more and more carbon. And the folding itself means that the small amounts of good quality steel formed was evenly spread over the entire structure of the forged blade.
steel is strong flesh is stronger!.
Ok, then give me a steel sword, and you stand there and we'll see which is stronger, your flesh or my sword.
get your own sword.
OK, then I'll use my OWN sword, and we'll see which is stronger.
Steel is strong, Flesh is stronger but the Will is Master.
ITS YOUR FAVORITE PART OF A CASTLE!
ITS VERY IMPORTANT FOR DEFENSE!!
IT STARTS WITH AN M!!!
*_MERRRLLOOOOOOOOOONS_*
Preußischer Soldat
MACHICULATIONS!
this kind of vid are very usefull to learn thing form the past. knowing this, it might help to improve the future
vikings had a very very very good way to get really shiny pure iron, and they got their iron from something that was like swampish dirt, but it had a lot of iron in it. but with all the dirt they had get it out, and I can't remember the process, but it was really really effective
Riddles of Steel sounds like a great name for a fantasy book series!