Quote:
Originally Posted by kacir
... and operated by blacksmith's son or apprentice. This was the main responsibility of the lowest ranking apprentice. So you have to go back and make this the main labour for the son ;-)
In the good old times they used "forged steel". Forged steel isn't simply a piece of steel that you put into forge and than hit with a hammer on an anvil. Back then they weren't able to achieve temperatures high enough to actually melt the metal. So they produced "blooms" - chunks of raw iron - from primitive kilns and what they got was sponge-like material with high content of iron and lots of impurities (mostly slag). To get material good enough to make a sword they had to heat the material in a forge repeatedly and hit it with hammer again and again and again and again. This forging forced [most of] the slag out of metal and you achieved fine structure. Fine structure is really important for strength, because it prevents microscopic fractures from spreading through material.
If you want your smith to produce really, *really* fancy sword (today monetary equivalent of fancy car), let him make one of "damascene" or "damascus" steel. The process of making this steel was very closely guarded secret (and as it turned out recently, it required iron from a specific place in India(*)). So other manufacturers cheated. They took two bars of different material, hard and soft, forged them together, then forged and folded then many times, then twisted the resulting long bar and forged it again. The result was very specific structure that was very strong (not as strong as genuine damascus steel) and had very specific look. To get this look you had to grind the sword, then polish it and then etch it with acid.
Look here for modern approximation http://www.mikov.cz/en/produkty/miko...-predator.html
See this nice page
http://www.tf.uni-kiel.de/matwis/ama...ed/t5_1_1.html
(*) at the very beginning of iron age India was producing most of the iron / steel in the world. So called wootz steel was very famous in its time.
I have a nice e-book about Damascus steel somewhere ... I will try to find it. In the meanwhile have a look at http://www.tf.uni-kiel.de/matwis/ama.../key_role.html |
Maybe I need to clarify more in my book, but the main character is not exactly an apprentice anymore. He has grown of age to where he is considered as equal to his father in the smithy shop.
As for all the links, thank you. I will have to pilfer through these along with the many other links.
And as for the damascus, I am trying to keep this a very simple blade so while the idea of it is tempting, I feel I should not try to write anymore than I have to.
I will keep all this information in mind when I go back to edit the novel. As of now, I have continued on the story with the basic scene I wrote to try to at least finish the chapter lest I get stuck on that scene for too long.