| ▲ | IAmBroom 3 hours ago | |
The opportunity for fraud is immense, unless the elite sourced their own meteorites. | ||
| ▲ | throwawayffffas 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | |
Iron smelting had not been invented yet. Meteorites were the only readily available source of iron. Upon the invention of smelting all iron rings appear to be smelted. | ||
| ▲ | mrec 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | |
How so? This was the Bronze Age; smelting iron ore wasn't really a thing yet, so meteoric iron was pretty much the only kind available. | ||
| ▲ | SideburnsOfDoom 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | |
> The opportunity for fraud is immense At the time, not so much. It was called "The Bronze Age" and "The Iron age" came later. The names aren't random. From the article: > The use of meteoritic iron particularly stands out during the Bronze Age because of the lack of iron smelting at the time. In other words, the main source of this special metal was when the Gods occasionally threw down a piece, in a column of fire. See also in ancient Egypt: https://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/museums/2013/09/01/23856/ https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S12962... | ||