Category: archaeology

In a fascinating twist of ancient chemistry, copper-smelting artisans may have stumbled upon a technique that would eventually lead to the intentional extraction of iron from ore, a discovery that was both accidental and revolutionary. A fresh analysis of slag, ores, and furnace residues from the 3, 000-year-old site of Kvemo Bolnisi, Georgia, is rewriting the story of how humankind first learned to make iron. A team of researchers from Cranfield University in England, reexamining old finds from Kvemo Bolnisi using modern techniques, suggests that what had once been labeled an early iron-smelting site was actually a copper workshop that utilized iron oxides.