Bulgarmaden: Thoughts about iron, Bolkardağ and the Taurus mountains

It has long been suspected that the use of iron predated the so-called meteoric and smelted iron of the later stages of prehistory. Certainly small objects of iron such as awls and pins are found from the Chalcolithic period onwards and the rightly famous iron swords from Alaca Höyük demonstrate skills in making larger weapons in the Early Bronze Age. I document the use of iron ore for hammers and maces at Early Bronze Age sites in the Taurus Mountains and early Chalcolithic Tell Kurdu in the Amuq valley. This intensive understanding of materials and their properties led, millennia later, to the ability to smelt terrestrial iron.