Bronze And Iron

[Demson]

I always thought iron was superior to bronze in every way. Wikipedia however:

 

Bronze is the traditional name for a broad range of alloys of copper. It is usually copper with zinc and tin but it is not limited to those metals. First used during the Bronze Age, to which it gave its name, bronze made tools, weapons and armor that were either harder or more durable than their stone and copper predecessors. During the Bronze Age, arsenic was often included in the bronze (mostly as an impurity), which made the alloy harder still. The earliest copper alloys date to the late 4th millennium BC, and are found in the context of the Maikop culture.

 

Bronze was also stronger than iron, another common metal of the era, and quality steels were not available until thousands of years later. Nevertheless the Bronze Age gave way to the Iron Age as the shipping of tin around the Mediterranean ended during the major population migrations around 1200

[longbow]

Some Archeologists did a experiment on tv,they made two swords using the ancient techniques one Iron and one Bronze.When they gave the weapons to a couple of reanactors to fight each other everyone expected the Bronze blade to shatter or at least have its edge folded over,but the opposite was true,it was the Iron blade with the folded edge the Bronze looked fine.

[P.Clodius]

I always thought bronze was weaker than iron too. Interesting. With regards to your comments about Britannia, sure tin and copper could have been factors for the invasion. I read another theory though I do not remember which book I gleaned it from. The theory was along the lines of the invasion and colonization of Britannia was a strategic move to secure the Atlantic coast of Gaul from raids by Frisian (Germanic) raiders. The raiders would now have to run the gauntlet of an English Channel occupied on both side by the Romans. Sorry I can't provide better detail but I remember thinking when I read it that it made perfect sense and fitted neatly with the common sense/practical approach that pervaded the Roman millitary machine.

[Primus Pilus]

Bronze may be stronger than Iron, but Steel is stronger than both. While the Romans, Celts and others didn't have a vast understanding of carbonizing iron to make steel, they used coal in their furnaces at first simply because it helped create high heat and later as a matter of course. The Romans were working with steel even though they may have thought that it was iron, and may have incorrectly believed it to be a stronger substance than bronze. (I don't honestly know the properties and their comparisons, but am quite comfortable that the primitive steel used was assuredly stronger than both)

[Favonius Cornelius]

I remember reading about the birth of the gladius. It was written that the Iberian peoples made the finest swords with their falcata. Their method of smithing resulted in a sword which could bend and yet spring back into its original form and remain considerably strong. Romans who fought in wars on the Iberian peninsula would brag about the dents in their helms from these swords. It was said that the Iberian smiths would hammer the iron they used into plates, then leave them to oxidize under sod. Supposedly this eliminated impure iron and left only the most pure to be used for the sword.

 

I don't know the accuracy of that, but it's what I read.

[longbow]

Found this site whilst looking for Info on Bronze age weapons,Irish short sword,appears the Irish Celts favoured a Gladius style weapon,i allways thought the Celts used slashing blades.

[Spurius]

Fined, or top of the line if you will, bronze weapons are indeed better than average or low quality iron weapons.

 

High quality iron is better than its bronze counterpart, and steel (as pointed out by Primus Pilus) of any quality is better than both.

 

Bronze is easier to work and fine than iron, but being an alloy...if you don't have tin and some lead, you don't have bronze (see why the Egyptians used copper so long, no accessible tin in Egypt). If you got iron, well, you got iron.

 

So, that's why if you got the choice between using cheap iron or bronze for something (like helments), the Romans would go for bronze to assure a better quality by easier manufacture. As forge techniques continued to improve, iron could be trusted more.

 

Also, remember that if everyday items were made from iron...we find fewer of them. Rust and scavenging for iron to make steel destroyed most of them...while bronze would still be recognizable but corroded.

[PerfectimusPrime]

Found this site whilst looking for Info on Bronze age weapons,Irish short sword,appears the Irish Celts favoured a Gladius style weapon,i allways thought the Celts used slashing blades.

They used both

[Demson]

I was under the impression Romans didn't make steel (consiousily and efficiently) neither.

 

Helmets were commonly of bronze. Protection to the head was very important, so it makes sense if they would use the best resource (and economically viable) they had.

 

I imagine low quality iron was easier to work then bronze, this more common in body armor (for the sake of replacement and maintaince) and everyday items.

 

They probably figured high-quality iron was a strong as bronze and choose them according to avaibility. If officers would be equiped with bronze instead of making high-quality iron (and steel) avaible, it makes sense.

 

Just my interpretation of course.

[Zeke]

Didn't the Celts have steel long before the Romans did?

 

Zeke

[PerfectimusPrime]

Didn't the Celts have steel long before the Romans did?

 

Zeke

Possible, I guess.

 

Celts were great blacksmiths.

[Spurius]

Didn't the Celts have steel long before the Romans did?

 

Zeke

True since as a group the Celts were around before the founding of Rome, and they had the iron working techniques to make steel.

 

In northern Italy, the Villanovan culture had hammered iron/steel about the 9th cen BCE, the Etruscans about the 8th cen. Both of course before the founding of Rome. Interesting sidenote: Western Italy was deforrested by the Etruscans early on for charcoal in forges. They were so bad at their refining that their slag dumps were used as sources for iron in both world wars.

 

The oldest iron weapon (a dagger) recovered is from Alaca Hoyuk in Turkey, dated to the 23rd cen BCE. The oldest hammered iron artifact comes from Egypt, dated about 1350 BCE. The earliest quench harden steel, from Cyprus about 1100 BCE.

 

But, with the OP, bronze was important and valuable to early Rome because its quality was easier to control in large scale production techniques. Later on it was supplanted by iron, but we have no clear idea how important iron was because of its destructability and everyday reuse.

[Pantagathus]

From all the things I've read on the subject of Bronze vs. Iron (& early steel) it always seems to point to the fact that good bronze (with the right amount of tin ~11%) made better armor & weapons that it's iron counterparts. Primarily this was due to bronze's resistance to oxidation compaired to iron (which made it weapon material of choice to ancient marines well into the iron age.)

 

It seems that the primary reason for the general switch was purely due to economy and not performance. Iron & early steel could be produced in larger quantities at a much cheaper price without having to worry about securing precarious overland and oceanic routes which had been controlled by the Phoenicians & Massalian-Phocaeans since the very late Bronze Age (i.e. Tin from Gallaecia & Cornwall). By the time Julius Ceasar conquered Gaul and Augustus brought Gallaecial Spain finally under submission the Romans had proved that they really didn't 'need' tin bronze for making war.

 

However, one must remember the other very important use of bronze in the ancient world beyond weapons: Statues

 

Statues were of course mostly made to be dedicated to Gods... If you don't have the Gods' favor all the weapons available didn't mean squat...