Peter,
our server was down all Sunday and Monday; thus a late contribution. There
is increasing evidence of industrial-scale crucible steel production during
the preiod you mention, i.e. 8th till 12th century AD, from a number of
places in Central Asia, particularly Uzbekistan (a site which is excavated
by Russian-Uzbek archaeologists, Akhsiket, in eastern Uzbekistan has
fragments of - my rough estimate - in the order of hundred thousand
crucibles, produced over the period you mention. Each crucible equals about
4 kg steel as a solid ingot.
Since the archaeology of this part of the world was hidden behind a
langauage and political barrier, it will take some time until this 'new'
research sinks into our minds. Apparently, much of the Indian archaeological
evidence for crucible steel making is rather much later, i.e., post-Medieval
in European terms (but see a first millennium AD exception in Sri Lanka, in
Juleff's 1999 book). The literary evidence for Indian iron and steel
production is a topic in its own right, and some scholars claim an
extraordinarily old and vast iron industry for India. Much of the discussion
regarding India has been carefully addressed by Bronson in Archeomaterials
almost ten years ago: And not all Indian steel is necessarily crucible steel
(again also see Gill Juleff's book for early furnace steel).
So I would rather be careful in excluding Central Asia from the picture for
Islamic Old World steel; after all, much of it - if not all - was under
their rule and/or part of their world. And the archaeological evidence for
crucible steel production a thousand years ago is certainly much more
impressive for Central Asia then for the Indian sub-continent.
Thilo Rehren, London.
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