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about swords, iron/steel and some physics
#16
Bryan wrote:
" Meanwhile, those iron blades that were case hardened on the edges, or pattern welded, or made with quality iron, and then heat treated, could be made to be flexible (as stated by Philon)."

no, they could not. physics of the construction stand against that. if you have, for example, a simple soft steel core with welded-on high carbon cutting edges which are properly hardened and tempered, the whole weapon will stay bent after a wrong hit. the edges alone would be flexible, but the soft, ductile core will not allow that. the same about pattern welded cores containing mostly soft steel and a grain structure destroyed or interrupted by the grinding of the blade.
to get a flexible blade you have to use a single bar of steel with the right carbon content and forge the blade out of this piece, then harden and quench it.
the main reason for the use of high carbon steel just on the edges of a blade is simply money: it`s expensive in time, manpower and resources to make steel (mainly by carburisation )


This is a little too vague to say yes or no on. First off Bryan said case hardening not butt welding edges to an iron core. There is a difference. case hardening is the adding of carbon to the whole exterior of a blade while the interior (possibly 1 - 5 mm inside) remains low in carbon. This is quite efficient on blades in particular because they are so thin and wide, therefore more surface area. YES this will give a blade springyness and it will create a quality weapon, assuming it was done properly with enough penetration of carbon.

Many methods of case hardening are also pretty simple and easy. low carbon steel or iron is sealed in a (ceramic probably) box with charcoal and heated up to high temperatures for a few hours, Done. Or thin folded (not yet welded!) Iron is brought up to welding temperatures (bright orange) and held there for around 30 minutes will pick up a few points of a percent of carbon. Both are tested using actually smelted iron and work quite well.

Also in most cases having steel edges will give some springyness to a blade. Again this depends on how much of the edge is steel and how high in carbon. It is totally possible for this to be plausible but, not always. It will guarantee a better cutting edge though.

When folks talk about the structure of steel and iron there are a few misconceptions going around id like to fix here. All of these swords are starting out as blooms from a smelting stack. This means they are folded (between a few times, to many dozens) to become a much more homogenous and silicate free piece of iron. If people are concerned of welds being exposed or that pattern welding/twisting or anything of the like having some effect on the structure for better or worse you are mistaken. when a weld is properly set it is set. potentially it can be a weak spot and weld flaws can grow BUT there are already many folds and welds going into even single bar swords. An experienced smith will not see problems where he has welded as far as delamination goes.

Doing tests on "welded steel" is not the same as historical steel. It is close but to differentiate modern welded steels from "modern mono steels" is calling the kettle black in my opinion. Without actually taking real historical smelted bloomery iron and steels, forging them and testing heat treatments, flexibility, edge retention etc there is no proper data collected. The chemical composition of modern steels welded or not are NOT THE SAME AS HISTORICAL STEELS. Tongue

Also there is this crazy idea that steel is "so laborious, time consuming and difficult to make." Where did this assumption come from? is it just assumed because steel is better than iron therefore more refined therefore harder to make. It is taking one more step in iron production but it is also simple and fast.

Heres a quick rundown of the most common ancient way to make steel documented by Aristotle!

Iron pieces (probably rods) go into a small hearth burning charcoal and fed by oxygen from the side. The iron goes into a semi-liquid (not melting) transition and gains carbon as it conglomerated at the bottom of the hearth. The steel is taken out and can be compacted a bit then forged into whatever is needed.

I have personally done this many times and made swords, of decent quality, but i dont think the romans grasped this on the chemical level we do and is therefore part of why this was not super common. It is evident that they did as time went on naturally.

Also this whole process takes about 30 minutes. Any one of you could do this in your backyard.

Ill even post a nice little video that shows steel being made then spark tested using only historical technology! :lol:
My friend and fellow bladesmith zeb demming doing what he does best.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHRyZESkMzA

So I apologize if I sound arrogant in any of my ramblings (not my intention). I like to read more than post but today I have information to share from experience and research on this subject. I have made reproductions of roman blades using ONLY bloomery steel and iron made exactly as the Romans did and tested their rigidity and found it to be very different from modern steels but still quite efficient in its own right. To be honest I am really just excited and am so glad to see this thread where people are looking so deeply into the making of roman swords. This does not get brought up enough so keep it rolling! everyones opinions and ideas are great.
Underhill Edge

Hand forged edged tools, blades, and functioning historical reproductions.

underhilledge.com

Jack McAuliffe
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#17
Quote:[i]Doing tests on "welded steel" is not the same as historical steel. It is close but to differentiate modern welded steels from "modern mono steels" is calling the kettle black in my opinion. Without actually taking real historical smelted bloomery iron and steels, forging them and testing heat treatments, flexibility, edge retention etc there is no proper data collected. The chemical composition of modern steels welded or not are NOT THE SAME AS HISTORICAL STEELS. Tongue

I`m very aware of that Wink

when I`m talking about welded steels I don`t mean making composites of modern alloyed steels or simple modern carbon steels but of different types of refined steels. different mainly in carbon and phosphor content and refined in different "stages" of purity to come close to the originals.
one main problem is that every single blade made by such a technique is (and was!!) always an individual item not being 100% comparable to another piece made in the same way.
a friend of mine once said: "making blade replicas is like baking marble cake: you can`t produce 2 which are exactly equal"
Als Mensch zu dumm, als Schwein zu kleine Ohren...

Jürgen Graßler

www.schorsch-der-schmied.de
www.facebook.com/pages/AG-Historisches-Handwerk/203702642993872
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#18
"c. 220BC to the Year Zero"

Gosh - right up until 1975 (Cambodian Year Zero)! Was this what you meant? After all, the year before AD1 (the first year of our Lord) was 1BC (first year before Christ). There was no ghostly year zero in between them.

Sorry - back to this fascinating topic now.

Crispvs
Who is called \'\'Paul\'\' by no-one other than his wife, parents and brothers.  :!: <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_exclaim.gif" alt=":!:" title="Exclamation" />:!:

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.romanarmy.net">www.romanarmy.net
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#19
It's called a metaphor, something obviously not recognized by everyone. In this case it denoted an indeterminate number. It's similar to Gildas writing, "... the vehicle of the bear." What bear? What vehicle? Was it a 1949 Ford? Wink
Alan J. Campbell

member of Legio III Cyrenaica and the Uncouth Barbarians

Author of:
The Demon's Door Bolt (2011)
Forging the Blade (2012)

"It's good to be king. Even when you're dead!"
             Old Yuezhi/Pazyrk proverb
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#20
My apologies if this has been mentioned already, I''ve only skimmed through the topic and wanted to put in a first post as it were.

Many years ago I examined the Llyn Cerrig Bach swords at the Welsh Museum. There were also section samples of these swords (iirc 4 or 5) which showed alternating bands of phosphorus iron and ferrite, a true proto pattern-welding. I would not say that hardened edges can be called pattern-welded.

I also weighed the swords and could dig that information out if anyone wants it. A copy made of one of the swords (ca 1st C) was as usual far too heavy and badly balanced.
The quality of the iron from Llyn Cerrig Bach is very high. the slave chains were in fact used by a tractor to tow a vehicle out of the bog. The swords were found bent almost double but did not break under the strain. I'll try to find the data - will take a bit of time - but length, weight etc is always useful to know.
Pattern-welding doesn't come into its own untill the Anglo Saxons though, so the Llyn Cerrig Bach swords were certainly very early.

I knew Radimir Pleiner reasonably well (must read that book again) - the swords, he said, would allow some movement near the tip but not much.

For my thesis I handled a number of swords from the Museum of London as well, but no Roman sword, either Gladius or Spatha was available.
It was interesting though that the big Norman two-hander (about 1 kilo in weight) was very easy to handle due to the perfect balance. Same with the bronze swords. The Welsh Museum also has a Celtic iron sword which is leaf-shaped, probably very early.
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#21
I am loathe to bring up the "ceremonial use" cop-out but, in this case, it might actually apply. The problem with Celtic swords is that a lot of the examples we have today were religiously sacrificed. We don't know how many of them were functional swords and how many were made for the sole purpose of being sacrificed. We know that some of their sacrificed swords were never meant for combat because they were not finished - they are unsharpened, or missing rivet holes, etc. It is possible that the high percentage of low quality blades reflect the fact that our sample does not include many swords that were ever intended for battle.
Author: Bronze Age Military Equipment, Pen & Sword Books
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#22
that may be the case elsewhere, although the condition of iron swords after immersion is often such that it is impossible to find a cutting edge in any case.
The Llynn Cerrig Bach hoard was found to be of high quality. Maybe due to the Anglesey site which would be close to the Druid's Isle of Mon.

I've read your book some time ago, it's great! thanks.
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#23
Quote:The quality of the iron from Llyn Cerrig Bach is very high. the slave chains were in fact used by a tractor to tow a vehicle out of the bog. The swords were found bent almost double but did not break under the strain. I'll try to find the data - will take a bit of time - but length, weight etc is always useful to know.
Pattern-welding doesn't come into its own untill the Anglo Saxons though, so the Llyn Cerrig Bach swords were certainly very early.

Its hugely discrediting to the Roman/Celtic/Germanic smiths of mid-late antiquity to say "pattern welding" did not into its own until the Anglo Saxons. Its a fact that after the 2nd century the Romans had pattern welded blades and developed further into late and post antiquity. Previous to this time I would argue yes more existed but other disagree. The issue I see now is people debating what "pattern welded steel" is. Piling layers of deferential carbon and phosphorus steel does make a visible pattern when polished.

Bottom line: is there any visible pattern in the steel? yes, then its pattern welded! Even in really simple and not purposeful designs it does exist.

Also Dan Howard makes a great point Ive never thought of which is who knows what is ceremonial and what is not.
Underhill Edge

Hand forged edged tools, blades, and functioning historical reproductions.

underhilledge.com

Jack McAuliffe
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#24
Thank you, Jack, for clarifying a very moot point. I take it that you're saying any folded steel sword that shows a pattern, whether it's a light pattern or heavy one (like Damascus), it's technically a "pattern welded" sword. Is this correct?

I know nothing of Celtic and Roman welded swords, other than they were apparently developed later than Sarmatian and Chinese varieties. There appears to be a difference between the Eastern and Western styles. Chinese folded steel was developed in the 4th to 3rd century BC. As time passed, the makers kept adding additional folds... finally to the point where the "pattern" diminishes in the eye of the beholder. A roughly 6,000 layer sword has no discernible pattern at all, there are so many folds. A 3,000 layer sword still shows a pattern but it's far less noticeable than the so-called Damascus variety seen in Western examples. The triple-layered san-mai blades were developed in the 1st century AD, sometimes called "hard and soft layering." And the clay-tempered "wavy" edges showed up at about the same time.

While there may be controversy as to which blade is superior, Western or Eastern, I have several repros that can cut a sheet of paper fluttering in the air. This is a testament to the quality, originality, and antiquity, of the Sarmatian sword and the Chinese examples that followed the original Saka/Sarmatian pattern.
Alan J. Campbell

member of Legio III Cyrenaica and the Uncouth Barbarians

Author of:
The Demon's Door Bolt (2011)
Forging the Blade (2012)

"It's good to be king. Even when you're dead!"
             Old Yuezhi/Pazyrk proverb
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#25
Although our Alan has a tendency to subscribe most inventions too Chinese or Asian nomads, I'm not sure about pattern welding. Wink In this thread on myarmoury you can see a celtic blade with pattern welded core (straight pattern, no swirls) dated to 300-200 BC.
Even greater surprise are pattern welded Etruscan swords, especially Vetulonia kopis from 7th century BC made of five different steel rods. This book mentions both this kopis and a 4th century BC pattern welded spearhead: https://books.google.hr/books?id=2Ofa_0Y...is&f=false
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#26
Thanks for that, Luka. I do take the "steppe perspective," mostly because that's my endeavor. But it certainly appears that pattern welding has been around for a long time in Europe, if not the Levant... where the Etruscans originally came from. :dizzy:
Alan J. Campbell

member of Legio III Cyrenaica and the Uncouth Barbarians

Author of:
The Demon's Door Bolt (2011)
Forging the Blade (2012)

"It's good to be king. Even when you're dead!"
             Old Yuezhi/Pazyrk proverb
Reply
#27
I get you, I've been a great fan of Celts and wasn't really happy to learn they weren't the ones who invented patternwelding like I thought before. Wink
Btw, could you maybe chime in my Alan/Sarmatian kit thread, I wonder what you think about the axe I would like to use as a sagaris...
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#28
Actually, this is quit simple. It is all about definitions. When making iron in those days, the quantities of the bloom (raw iron straight from the furnace) were often too small to make a sword. Each bloom from the iron winning process was hammered out and folded and hammered out again to get rid of the impurities. Finger thick rods were hammered out and sold as stock to blacksmiths. These either combined the low carbon rods to make a blank for a sword, or first improved (some of) the rods by case hardening, which introduced carbon to create a steel. But they had to beware, as medium carbon steel is a real pain to succesfully weld! Now some mines had ore naturaly enriched with chroom, phosphorus, vanadium, arsenic, all which could improve the quality of the iron. So iron from these mines yielded better swords then mines which did not have ore with natural enrichments. Combining the rods and welding them together produced a sword blank. So to some extent, ALL pre Industrial were welded, if only to get a blank large enough to hammer into a sword. Using a stock of iron from one single source would produce a mono-iron with no distinguisable patterns (but stringy iron all the same), combining various sources would lead to a recognisable pattern when polished, as Jack says. Miks calls this "Streifendamast", with long lines visible from the proces of welding the rods to make a blade.
Salvete et Valete



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Robert P. Wimmers
www.erfgoedenzo.nl/Diensten/Creatie Big Grin
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#29
Gents, this whole post is fascinating and breaks things down in a very easy to understand manner.
Mike Daniels
a.k.a

Titus Minicius Parthicus

Legio VI FFC.


If not me...who?

If not now...when?
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