from the what-have-the-Romans-ever-done-for-us? dept.
Iberians were using heavy metal on hard rock way before it was cool:
It's time to update the history books again. A group of researchers in Germany have shown that steel tools were being used in the Iberian peninsula at least as long ago as 900 BCE – far earlier than it was believed knowledge of the metal had made its way to the region.
The team, led by University of Freiburg archaeologist Ralph Araque Gonzalez, base their claims on geochemical and metallographic analyses – and some good old fashioned experimental archaeology. They demonstrated that a series of engravings on stone pillars found in the region from the late Bronze Age could only have been made with tools made from proper steel, and it was most likely developed locally.
According to the team's paper on the research, the final bronze age (FBA) in the Iberian peninsula lasted from around 1200–800 BCE, and the early iron age (EIA) lasted roughly 200 years after that. Despite that commonly accepted timeline, the team said a series of engraved steles identified as from the FBA/EIA and examined as part of the study were mostly made of extremely hard rock – similar to quartzite.
[...] According to the University of Freiburg, up until recently it was believed the ability to create steel – an alloy of iron and carbon – only became widespread in Europe with the expansion of the Roman Empire.
[...] But evidence of steel tools in Iberia hundreds of years earlier raises a question: how did they get there? Based on where the tool was found, and the context in which it was discovered, Araque Gonzalez concluded that the Romans probably had nothing to do with it.
[...] "Iron metallurgy including the production and tempering of steel were probably indigenous developments of decentralized small communities in Iberia, and not due to the influence of later colonization processes," Araque Gonzalez hypothesized.
Journal Reference:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2023.105742
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 09, @02:25AM (2 children)
I don't see actual evidence that a steel tool was used. Just a claim that the rock is so hard that you can only carve stuff in it with steel:
The last I checked there's plenty of stuff harder than steel. Quartz is harder than steel. Maybe some dude found an even harder rock/stone and used it to carve the stuff on the hard rock.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 09, @02:53AM (1 child)
Really they used the brains of a stump-head AC who was so hard-headed they could cut very hard rock with it.
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by khallow on Thursday March 09, @05:55AM
(Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Thursday March 09, @05:12AM (2 children)
But where did they get the electric guitars and amplifiers?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 5, Funny) by turgid on Thursday March 09, @07:42AM
Bill and Ted had a time machine.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Funny) by Opportunist on Thursday March 09, @08:07AM
We didn't find any. So the logical conclusion is that they already invented the wireless air guitar.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 09, @07:56AM
Let's grant the claim - then what? It didn't seem to help much, did it? What's the lesson here - don't invent steel unless you want drunk English people dancing on your plazas, drinking sangria and shagging your daughters 2000 years from now. Respectin' the cultcha.