Most Bronze Age iron artifacts came from Space

At a time when human societies had not yet mastered iron smelting (the process requires temperatures of around 1,538 °C), the Bronze Age and its iron objects have always intrigued researchers.

Before we learned how to smelt iron ore, the easiest iron to work with would be the metallic iron already found in certain meteorites. The truth is that many of these objects were made with meteoric iron, as ZAP has noted several times over the years.

One of the best-known examples is the Tutankhamun’s daggeralready identified as being made from metal coming from a meteorite. Recent studies indicate that most, or even all, of the iron objects analyzed from the Bronze Age have extraterrestrial origin.

Another curious case is that of , discovered in 1963, in Alicante, Spain. The set includes 66 archaeologically relevant pieces, mostly in gold and silver, such as cups, flasks, bracelets and other ornaments. The presence of two small pieces of iron — a hollow semi-sphere covered in gold and an open bracelet — led some researchers to defend a later date for the treasure, already in the middle of the Iron Age.

However, later chemical analyzes suggested another interpretation: the iron in these pieces corresponds better to the composition of meteoric material than to that of iron produced by smelting. This allowed the group to be dated to the Late Bronze Age, between around 1400 and 1200 BC, without the need to review the archaeological chronology.

In ancient Egypt, points out, iron also seemed to have a strong symbolic value. According to researcher Diane Johnson, at the beginning of the 19th dynasty, around 1295 BC, a new hieroglyphic term emerged to designate iron: bi-An-pt, or “iron from the sky”. Texts from the time also link iron to the sky and to the image of the dead king who would live forever as a star.

A study published in 2017, based on the analysis of the proportion between nickel and iron in Bronze Age artifacts, concluded that the specimens examined were . The authors therefore argue that the chances of early iron smelting at that time should be revised.