When Did Humans Learn How To Make Bronze

The Iron Age was a menstruum in homo history that started betwixt 1200 B.C. and 600 B.C., depending on the region, and followed the Rock Age and Bronze Age. During the Iron Age, people across much of Europe, Asia and parts of Africa began making tools and weapons from iron and steel. For some societies, including Ancient Greece, the beginning of the Atomic number 26 Historic period was accompanied by a period of cultural decline.

Humans may have smelted iron sporadically throughout the Bronze Age, though they likely saw iron as an inferior metal. Atomic number 26 tools and weapons weren't as hard or durable every bit their bronze counterparts.

The use of atomic number 26 became more widespread after people learned how to make steel, a much harder metal, by heating iron with carbon. The Hittites—who lived during the Statuary Age in what is now Turkey—may have been the first to make steel.

When Was the Iron Age?

The Fe Age began around 1200 B.C. in the Mediterranean region and Nearly East with the plummet of several prominent Bronze Age civilizations, including the Mycenaean civilization in Greece and the Hittite Empire in Turkey. Ancient cities including Troy and Gaza were destroyed, merchandise routes were lost and literacy declined throughout the region.

The crusade for the collapse of these Statuary Age kingdoms remains unclear. Archaeological evidence suggests a succession of severe droughts in the eastern Mediterranean region over a 150-year period from 1250 to 1100 B.C. likely figured prominently in the collapse. Earthquakes, famine, sociopolitical unrest and invasion by nomadic tribes may also take played a role.

Some experts believe that a disruption in trade routes may accept acquired shortages of the copper or tin used to brand bronze effectually this time. Metal smiths, every bit a issue, may have turned to fe as an alternative.

Many scholars place the terminate of the Iron Age in at around 550 BC, when Herodotus, "The Begetter of History," began writing "The Histories," though the cease date varies past region. In Scandinavia, it ended closer to 800 AD with the rise of the Vikings. In Western and Central Europe, the end of the Iron Age is typically identified every bit coinciding with the Roman conquest during the first century BC.

Greek Dark Ages

Greece had go a major hub of activity and culture on the Mediterranean during the belatedly Bronze Age. The Mycenaean culture was rich in fabric wealth from trade. Mycenaeans congenital big palaces and a society with strict class hierarchy.

Merely around 1200 B.C. Mycenaean Greece collapsed. Greece entered a menstruation of turmoil sometimes called the Greek Dark Ages.

Archaeologists believe at that place may accept been a period of famine in which Greece'due south population dropped dramatically during this time. Major cities (with the exception of Athens) were abandoned. Equally urban societies splintered, people moved toward smaller, more pastoral groups focused on raising livestock.

Mycenaean Greece had been a literate gild, but the Greeks of the early Iron Historic period left no written record, leading some scholars to believe they were illiterate. Few artifacts or ruins remain from the catamenia, which lasted roughly 300 years.

Past the late Iron Age, the Greek economic system had recovered and Hellenic republic had entered its "classical" period. Classical Greece was an era of cultural achievements including the Parthenon, Greek drama and philosophers including Socrates.

The classical period as well brought political reform and introduced the world to a new system of government known every bit demokratia, or "rule past the people."

Persian Empire

During the Iron Historic period in the About East, nomadic pastoralists who raised sheep, goats and cattle on the Iranian plateau began to develop a state that would go known equally Persia.

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The Persians established their empire at a fourth dimension after humans had learned to brand steel. Steel weapons were sharper and stronger than earlier statuary or rock weapons.

The aboriginal Persians also fought on horseback. They may accept been the first civilisation to develop an armored cavalry in which horses and riders were completely covered in steel armor.

The First Persian Empire, founded by Cyrus the Cracking around 550 B.C., became one of the largest empires in history, stretching from the Balkans of Eastern Europe to the Indus Valley in India.

Iron Age In Europe

Life in Iron Age Europe was primarily rural and agricultural. Iron tools made farming easier.

Celts lived across almost of Europe during the Iron Historic period. The Celts were a collection of tribes with origins in fundamental Europe. They lived in small communities or clans and shared a like linguistic communication, religious beliefs, traditions and civilisation. It's believed that Celtic culture started to evolve as early as 1200 B.C.

The Celts migrated throughout Western Europe—including United kingdom, Ireland, France and Spain. Their legacy remains prominent in Ireland and Great Uk, where traces of their language and civilization are withal prominent today.

Iron Historic period Hill Forts

Iron Age Hill Fort — Aerial view of archway to Old Oswestry Hill Fort in the Welsh Marches near Oswestry in north west Shropshire during the Iron Age.

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People throughout much of Celtic Europe lived in hill forts during the Atomic number 26 Age. Walls and ditches surrounded the forts, and warriors defended hill forts against attacks by rival clans.

Inside the hill forts, families lived in simple, circular houses made of mud and wood with thatched roofs. They grew crops and kept livestock, including goats, sheep, pigs, cows and geese.

Bog Bodies

Hundreds of bog bodies dating dorsum to the Iron Historic period have been discovered across Northern Europe. Bog bodies are corpses that take been naturally mummified or preserved in peat bogs.

Examples of Fe Age bog bodies include the Tollund Human being, constitute in Denmark, and the Gallagh Human being from Ireland.

The mysterious bog bodies announced to have at least i thing in common: They died brutal deaths. For instance, Lindow Man, establish near Manchester, England, appears to have been striking over the head, had his throat slit and was whipped with a rope made of animate being sinew before existence thrown into the watery bog.

The Celtic tribes had no written language at the time, so they left no tape of why these people were killed and thrown in bogs. Some experts believe the bog bodies may have been ritually killed for religious reasons.

Other Iron Age artifacts including swords, cups, and shields have as well been institute buried in peat bogs. These too may have served as offerings to pagan gods in religious ceremonies led by Druid priests.