12-13-2013, 12:58 PM
Quote:Therefore I would think that Roman iron got its hardness from just such treatment with a lot of this hammering, [...].In this video about medieval armour Jeffrey D. Wasson states that according to surviving examples of armour the curving of sheet metal was always achieved by hammering:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgzQiO9liNw
So your assumption regarding work-hardening might be true.