Meteoric Blades on Bronze Age Weapons

[mariusgmioc]

Originally Posted by ariel

A very famous and highly professional and talented bladesmith from Russia by the name Leonid Arkhangelski described in his book “ Damascus Steel” his attempts to make a knife blade out of a meteorite. It was an abject failure: whether cold or hot, it crumbled under the hammer.

Hello Ariel,

Maybe Mr. Arkhangelski experimented with the wrong type of meteorite. I have a couple of meteorite fragments from the Campo del Cielo meteorite and they are almost pure iron-nickel alloy (93% Iron, about 7% Ni and the rest a mixture of Co, P, Ge, etc. in negligible quantities). I don't see how such meteorite cannot be worked hot or even cold.

[ariel]

You are correct, and I mentioned this point in the last sentence.
Still, with iron weapons available within the trading area, potentially including even the Philistines, I still think that Occam rule is likely applicable.

With nickel wouldn’t it exhibit something resembling Indonesian pamor?