TL4 Without Iron

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Not

Adam Smith mused that it was a mystery how iron mining got going, since it's found deep within the earth: presumably someone knew to look for it! (I assume the question has since been answered, but I don't know myself.)

Are iron meteorites available, if rare?

Well, first off not all iron ore is (or was) deep beneath the earth. I wouldn't take your geological expertise from an economist :)

Yes, iron or nickle-iron meteorites aren't particularly unusual, as far as significant-sized meteorites that make it to the surface without completely disintegrating go. They're a large portion of asteroids, and tough so have good odds of surviving atmospheric entry.

Some iron artifacts have been determined to be forged from meteoric iron. Before you ask, it's generally not very interesting, verging on "worse than" boring earthly iron, simply because you don't have to know a lot to get access to it, therefore you often don't know to refine the metal properly :)


Native iron (and meteoric iron) introduces you to the idea of iron. But if you're mining copper, you've probably figured out copper ore and the idea of "fancy coloured rocks what got metal in them" is a well known thing. After THAT, with that bit of trivia floating around, inevitably someone is going to wonder about ores of iron.

The (somewhat) trickier part is learning THIS ore has iron in it, since you're not going to accidentally get it out when smelting copper, tin, or gold under normal conditions. I idly wonder if experiments in pottery or glassmaking turned it up first; iron ores usually make lovely black and red pigments, and ceramics need some high temperatures.