In response to your question:

>Question (again from a practical worker rather than a researcher!):
>
>Are the furnaces mentioned above merely larger attempts to fine
control the
>processing of ore to allow for possible 'wrought steel'  production? I
mean
>this as opposed to producing the normal wrought iron of the purpose.
My
>understanding is that  the control of the conditions in the furnace
that
>allowed for the carbon content  to remain 'high' was not well
understood
>and was more of an 'accident'. Getting a furnace load to retain even
.5 %
>carbon in the mix would of great value for tool / weapons end use for
the
>material. If you got the process wrong you could end up with way too
much
>carbon - and then 'cast' iron. To a medieval smith, this would be
spoiled
>material (you can't forge it!) and he would just re-process the load.

I'd like to point you to an article by Killick that is most marvelously
argued, refers to steel making in African as well as in European and
Asian smelting processes, and I think suggests that controlling the
carbon content of the bloom should not be considered as anything more
than one of the technical skills that most smelters mastered.

The culture and technology of African iron production / edited by Peter
R. Schmidt
Gainesville : University Press of Florida, c1996
chapter 11    On Claims For "Advanced" Ironworking Technology in
Precolonial Africa / David Killick     p.247-

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Skip Williams