Noric steel was a
steel
Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistant ty ...
from
Noricum
Noricum () is the Latin name for the Celts, Celtic kingdom or federation of tribes that included most of modern Austria and part of Slovenia. In the first century AD, it became a Roman province, province of the Roman Empire. Its borders were th ...
, a
Celtic
Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to:
Language and ethnicity
*pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia
**Celts (modern)
*Celtic languages
**Proto-Celtic language
* Celtic music
*Celtic nations
Sports Fo ...
kingdom located in modern Austria and
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
.
The proverbial hardness of Noric steel is expressed by
Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
: ''"...durior
..ferro quod noricus excoquit ignis..."'' which roughly translates to "...harder than iron which Noric fire tempers
as_Anaxarete_towards_the_advances_of_Iphis.html" ;"title="Anaxarete.html" ;"title="as Anaxarete">as Anaxarete towards the advances of Iphis">Anaxarete.html" ;"title="as Anaxarete">as Anaxarete towards the advances of Iphis]..." and it was widely used for the weapons of the Roman military after Noricum joined the Empire in 16 BC.
The iron ore was quarried at two mountains in modern Austria still called ''Erzberg'' "ore mountain" today, one at
Hüttenberg
Hüttenberg is a municipality in the Lahn-Dill-Kreis in Hesse, Germany.
Geography
Location
Hüttenberg lies about 6 km southeast of Wetzlar and 10 km southwest of Giessen south of the river Lahn.
Neighbouring communities
Hüttenberg b ...
,
Carinthia
Carinthia (german: Kärnten ; sl, Koroška ) is the southernmost States of Austria, Austrian state, in the Eastern Alps, and is noted for its mountains and lakes. The main language is German language, German. Its regional dialects belong to t ...
and the other at
Eisenerz
Eisenerz (; "Iron ore") is a market place and old mining town in the Austrian state of Styria, . N.W. of Graz by rail. Pop. (2001) 6,400. It is situated in the deep Erzbach Valley, dominated on the east by the Pfaffenstein , on the west by t ...
,
Styria
Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered to ...
,
separated by . The latter is the site of the modern
Erzberg mine
The Erzberg mine is a large open-pit mine located in Eisenerz, Styria, in the central-western part of Austria, 60 km north-west of Graz and 260 km south-west of the capital, Vienna. Erzberg represents the largest iron ore reserves in Aus ...
.
Buchwald identifies a sword of found in Krenovica,
Moravia
Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia.
The me ...
as an early example of Noric steel due to a chemical composition consistent with Erzberg ore. A more recent sword, dating to and found in
Zemplin, eastern
Slovakia
Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the s ...
, is of extraordinary length for the period (95 cm, 37 in) and carries a stamped Latin inscription (?V?TILICI?O), identified as a "fine sword of Noric steel" by Buchwald. A center of manufacture was at
Magdalensberg
Magdalensberg ( Slovene: ''Štalenska gora'') is a market town in the district of Klagenfurt-Land in Carinthia in Austria.
Geography
Magdalensberg lies at the foot of the Magdalensberg in the Klagenfurt basin in the lower Gurk valley. The Gurk an ...
.
See also
*
Iron Age Europe
In Europe, the Iron Age is the last stage of the prehistoric period and the first of the protohistoric periods,The Junior Encyclopædia Britannica: A reference library of general knowledge. (1897). Chicago: E.G. Melvin. (seriously? 1897 "Junior" ...
*
Iron Age sword
Swords made of iron (as opposed to bronze) appear from the Early Iron Age (c. 12th century BC), but do not become widespread before the 8th century BC.
Early Iron Age swords were significantly different from later steel swords. They were work-har ...
*
La Tène culture
The La Tène culture (; ) was a European Iron Age culture. It developed and flourished during the late Iron Age (from about 450 BC to the Roman conquest in the 1st century BC), succeeding the early Iron Age Hallstatt culture without any defini ...
*
History of ferrous metallurgy
Ferrous metallurgy is the metallurgy of iron and its alloys. The earliest surviving prehistoric iron artifacts, from the 4th millennium BC in Egypt, were made from meteoritic iron-nickel. It is not known when or where the smelting of iron from ...
*
Toledo steel
Toledo steel, historically known for being unusually hard, is from Toledo, Spain, which has been a traditional sword-making, metal-working center since about the Roman period, and came to the attention of Rome when used by Hannibal in the Punic W ...
*
Damascus steel
Damascus steel was the forged steel of the blades of swords smithed in the Near East from ingots of Wootz steel either imported from Southern India or made in production centres in Sri Lanka, or Khorasan, Iran. These swords are characterized by ...
*
Wootz steel
Wootz steel, also known as Seric steel, is a crucible steel characterized by a pattern of bands and high carbon content. These bands are formed by sheets of microscopic carbides within a tempered martensite or pearlite matrix in higher carbon ...
*
Bulat steel
Bulat is a type of steel alloy known in Russia from medieval times; it was regularly mentioned in Russian legends as the material of choice for cold steel. The name ''булат'' is a Russian transliteration of the Persian word ''fulad'', meani ...
*
Tamahagane steel
''Tamahagane'' (玉鋼) is a type of steel made in the Japanese tradition. The word ''tama'' means "precious". The word ''hagane'' means "steel". Tamahagane is used to make Japanese swords, knives, and other kinds of tools.
The carbon content ...
*
Crucible steel
Crucible steel is steel made by melting pig iron (cast iron), iron, and sometimes steel, often along with sand, glass, ashes, and other fluxes, in a crucible. In ancient times steel and iron were impossible to melt using charcoal or coal fires ...
References
History of metallurgy
Industry in ancient Rome