User:Ahanson11020/Blacksmith

Medieval Period

According to Steven P. Ashby, author of Crafts and Social Networks In Viking Towns, "from the time of its introduction to northern Europe, iron was produced by what is often referred to as the ‘direct process’ in which the ore was "smelted with charcoal, resulting in the production of a heterogeneous iron ‘bloom’ which had then to be worked by smiths to produce a serviceable metal."

European blacksmiths before and through the medieval era spent a great deal of time heating and hammering iron before forging it into finished articles. Although they were unaware of the chemical basis, they were aware that the quality of the iron was thus improved. From a scientific point of view, the reducing atmosphere of the forge was both removing oxygen (rust), and soaking more carbon into the iron, thereby developing increasingly higher grades of steel as the process was continued.

Weapons

In the Middle Ages, there was probably not a more important profession than that of the town Blacksmith or Metalworker.

Without them to skillfully forge weapons, it is fair to assume that the "Age Of Knights" never would have come to fruition. While blacksmiths during this time made everything from iron fence posts to kitchen cutlery, one of their most important and revered roles was to forge weapons for knights and warriors in the city or village.

Blacksmiths of this time took great pride in the weapons that they forged; often imbuing them with complicated and intricate detail, possibly to show off their skill to wherever the user carried it.

Swords

According to The Sword In Early Medieval Northern Europe: Experience, Identity, Representation, blacksmiths often "seemed little concerned with characterizing scabbards or the finer features of blades, they depicted hilts in conspicuous detail. Both straight and curved types of sword guard were portrayed, and some images strove for even greater accuracy."

Further, in many parts of the world - not just Europe- swords were believed to be 'living' entities, and were seen as "dynamic, active, ‘living’ artifacts in early medieval minds. This notion divides into swords perceived as ‘person-like’ artifacts with an outer visual character and an inner personality or biography." For example, during the era of Samurai in Japan, the katana sword wielded by the Samurai warrior was believed to harbor the spirits of their ancestors, who would protect them and watch over them in battle. It was also believed that the Samurai katana was a physical extension of ones soul, so the warrior must learn to use it as effectively as using ones own arm or leg. Further, in Europe, the sword was often a "potent symbol, especially of leadership in the ruling classes. One would be given to a boy as a gift at birth, at his naming, or when he reached manhood...in some cases, the sword would not be new but would be a family treasure that had been passed down from one warrior to the next, a token of past wars fought, maybe for many generations."

Armor

In addition to making weapons, blacksmiths of the middle ages were also tasked with forging armor for knights. It goes without saying that armor for knights was critical. The main armor, called plate armor, was heavy and unwieldy, but was the difference between life and death on the battlefield. During this period, the development of plate armor came slow. For example, it is clear that the development of plate armor started with the addition of "plated to cover and protect the joints, especially the elbows and knees", followed by the development of armor to "cover the front and sides of the knees, called poleyns...and disc-shaped couters, or armor to protect the elbows, followed a decade or so after that."

Often, under their plate armor, knights would wear what was called chain mail, or iron rings that were linked together to form an extra protective layer. This can be seen as early as the Romans, who would wear what was called Lorica Hamata, a style of armor that was made of individual metal rings that were either 'solid rings' - punched out of a piece of sheet metal and linked together- or threaded together with wire. This armor was made from "alternate rows of solid and butted wire rings, the wire rings used to secure the solid rings, in an interlocking pattern of rows in which each ring was joined to four others, two in the row above it and two in the row below. Some 35,000 to 40,000 rings were needed to make a complete cuirass."

Firearms

Though not appearing on the battlefields of Europe until the late Middle Ages, when firearms did appear, they made a world of difference in tactical development and how battles were fought. Even though gunpowder was invented in China as early as the 9th century, the technology didn't make its way to Europe until around the 13th or 14th century. At this time, armies were generally made up of highly skilled knights, who had been training for war since they were children. The introduction of the firearm changed this. The kingdoms of Europe no longer required thousands of heavily armored knights to do their bidding, because, although well trained and armored, they were expensive to recruit, arm, train, and maintain. They also no longer required archers or those armed with crossbows. It was a lot cheaper and much more efficient to hand a firearm to a relatively untrained, expendable peasant and just say "go". This also created a new profession with its roots in blacksmithing and metalworking: the gunsmith. Further, the introduction of the firearm to the battlefields of Europe ushered in a new "Gunpowder Revolution" (1300-1650) in which all the armies of Europe did away with their antiquated system of military organization, which primarily focused on knights, archers, and crossbow troops, to an army that was armed with firearms - combining all of these roles into one, making a, not only cheaper but also a much more effective, soldier. Some of the earliest guns, made with a bronze/copper alloy, appeared by at least 1353, when "four guns made out of a copper-alloy were produced for the privy wardrobe by a brasier, William de Algate." Further, the production was very complex and complicated. The method of production often involved "heating copper, along with another metal, almost always tin, at a sufficiently high temperature until it became liquid, after which it was then poured into a mould, usually of metal or clay". However, by the late 14th century, most of these guns were instead manufactured by founders, or what we would call a gunsmith, who were primarily employed by religious institutions, like the Catholic Church, to cast and make bells. According to Spencer, it is possible that, because guns were getting more complicated, this change was "prompted by technological advances in gun-making, which required more specialist skills." Later, gunsmiths invented the first gun made of iron. This was a big development, as "wrought iron is an alloy that is known for its ductile and malleable properties" which made for easier production. According to Spencer, "

A type of furnace known as a bloomery was used to extract workable iron by smelting the ore, which involved placing layers of charcoal in the bloomer and then firing, with air circulated by means of bellows. The wrought iron could then be used to forge guns by a process of hammer welding strips of metal together on an anvil, with the metal heated to approximately 1,100 C. The weapons were constructed in two parts, consisting of barrels and powder chambers, which were assembled by binding long bars, known as staves, with hoops and bands. The latter two objects were made by means of wrapping iron around an object called a mandrel and then hammer welding the ends together.

This ease of production and the solid dependability of the wrought iron material may explain why guns made of iron became heavily favored in the 15th century by gunsmiths and consumers/users alike.

Handguns

Another important innovation in the field of firearms was the first handheld black powder infantry weapon, what we know today as the handgun. While considered by many modern historians to be inadequate, inaccurate, and ineffective, medieval handguns were actually incredibly effective, as author Sean McLachlan argues in his book, Medieval Handgonnes: The First Black Powder Infantry Weapons. In his book, McLachlan writes, "

Pre-matchlock handgonnes have been much maligned by historians, many of whom dismiss them as inaccurate, primitive contraptions that did little other than scare the enemy and endanger the user; however, an examination of medieval chronicles and the experiences of modern experimental archaeologists and re-enactors show otherwise. Early handgonnes, while slow to reload and inaccurate at long range, had superior penetrative power compared to bows and crossbows, and proved their worth time and again on the battlefield.

Although seen as a useless weapon, we know now how effective it was on the battlefield. That being said, early firearms were essentially just metal cylinders attached to pieces of wood. According to McLachlan, early handguns were extremely rudimentary; he writes, "

The first and apparently earliest type of handgonne consisted of a short bronze or iron barrel mounted on a much longer wooden pole. The section of the exterior of the barrel could be round, hexagonal, or octagonal. The muzzle was sometimes thickened to form a ring, reinforcing the point at which the escaping gases would be at their strongest. The touch-hole was set near the rear end of the barrel at the top and was rarely fitted with any sort of pan, rather being a simple cup with a vent hole leading down to the charge.

Further, the advent of handguns to the battlefield greatly changed the face of war forever, essentially eliminating the need for knights forever more.

Non-Military Blacksmithing

Blacksmiths during the Middle Ages were primarily devoted to forging weapons and armor for the warrior elites of the day, the knights. However, not everyone could be a warrior. Thus, blacksmiths of the day were tasked with forging things for regular townspeople, as well. One of the most important cornerstones of the medieval economy, in fact, was agriculture. Blacksmiths and farmers during this time worked hand in hand.

Horseshoes

At this time, most means of transportation and farm tools, such as the wagon, were horse-drawn. And, as such, horseshoes were an extremely important commodity, and almost as valuable to the farmer as the horse itself. In a time of unpaved roads, where the primary (and only) mode of transportation was the horse, a solid horseshoe was an indispensable piece of technology to the farmers of the day. It allowed for their horses to go further distances over otherwise unsuitable terrain like mud or rocks.

The Plow

One of the most important farming implements that has ever been invented was the plow. Often considered the "first application of non-human power to agriculture", the plow was truly a revolutionary tool for farmers. The earliest plows were simple and rudimentary; they were essentially "an enlarged digging-stick dragged by a pair of oxen." While this type of plow is still to this day very popular in the Mediterranean, this type of plow was ill suited for Northern Europe, as the soil was much heavier and the summers much wetter. Further, the style of farming that this plow afforded was very inconvenient. As this type of plow had a "conical or triangular shape", the plow does not effectively turn over the soil, a wedge of undisturbed earth is left between the plowed sections. This type of plow also required a technique called cross-plowing. With this technique, the soil is pulverized, which then "prevents undue evaporation of moisture in dry climates and helps to keep the fields fertile." Needless to say, this is a very complicated and labor intensive process. Thus, the invention of the heavy plow. This new type of plow, pulled by around 8 oxen, was much better suited to the soil of Northern Europe. This type of plow had three functioning parts: a poulter, or knife like object that cuts vertically into the soil; a flat plowshare, set at right angles, that cuts into the earth horizontally, down to the roots; and a mouldboard that cuts the soil either the right or left, depending on how it was attached. There were also three specific advantages that the heavy plow had on the European soil than the early version did. First, the heavy plow "handled the clods with such violence that the need for cross-plowing was eliminated." Not only did this save time and energy, it also increased the general area of the field in which one could farm. Second, by eliminating cross-plowing, the heavy plow tended to change the very shape of farm fields in Northern Europe, from roughly square shaped into fields that were "long and narrow, with a slightly rounded vertical cross-section for each strip-field which had salutary effects on drainage." This changing of the shape of farm fields resulted in each strip becoming a "low ridge, assuring a crop on the crest even in the wettest years, and in the intervening long depression, or furrow, in the driest seasons." The third and final advantage was that of saving time and energy. Without this type of plow, it was extremely difficult to work the "dense, rich, alluvial bottom lands which, if properly handled, would give the peasant far better crops than he could get from the light-soils of the uplands."

References

Ashby, Steven. Crafts And Social Networks In Viking Towns, 2020.

Brunning, Sue. The Sword In Early Medieval Europe, 2019.

Smith, Douglas. Medieval Military Technology, 2012. University of Toronto Press.

White, Lynn. Medieval Technology and Social Change, 1962. Oxford University Press.

Spencer, Dan. Royal and Urban Gunpowder Weapons in Late Medieval England, 2019. The Boydell Press.

McLachlan, Sean. Medieval Handgonnes: The First Black Powder Infantry Weapons, 2010. Osprey Publishing.