Reassessing Evidence for Early Iron Production in the Near East

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Archaeological Science and African Archaeology: Appreciating the Impact of David Killick" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Work by David Killick and colleagues has documented rich landscapes of iron production sites in sub-Saharan Africa. By contrast, iron smelting and smithing sites have proven far more elusive in the Caucasus and the rest of the Near East. This situation has severely hampered our understanding of iron metallurgy in the areas where it first originated. The picture has improved in the last 20 years, particularly regarding certain stages of production (e.g., smithing) in certain geographic areas (e.g., the southern Levant). Nonetheless, direct evidence of iron smelting in the Near East remains surprisingly spotty, not only for the Early Iron Age but also for subsequent eras. Focusing on the Caucasus, this paper reviews the impact of recent research on prior assessments of iron metallurgical innovation and presents new data on Late Bronze and Early Iron Age metallurgical sites in Georgia and Armenia. The results underline the importance of caution in evaluating claims of iron metallurgical debris in the literature, and the value of reanalyzing material from previously excavated sites. This research provides insights into the social and economic contexts of iron working, while also bringing persistent knowledge gaps into sharper focus.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Archaeological Science and African Archaeology: Appreciating the Impact of David Killick   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37439.0