In a message dated 06/03/99 00:53:23, Ron Reno writes:
<< An earlier example of unintentional fluxing at Medieval workings at Minepit
Wood, Sussex, is offered by J.H. Money in MEDIEVAL ARCHAEOLOGY 15 (1971).
In this case the iron ore co-occurs with a thin bed of shelly limestone.
Lucky fellows! >>
It is possible to infer that Wealden iron founders continued to use limestone
in an iron matrix for fluxing into the eighteenth century, without necessarily
appreciating that it was the limestone which was the significant component.
They recognised several grades of the clay ironstone ore in the Wealden beds,
and mixed them to produce the furnace charge; the limestone, or 'pitty' ore
(perhaps because of its dimpled surface caused by the cyrena shells) was one
of those grades.
Jeremy Hodgkinson
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