章 13: Chapter 13: Sidestory 2 - Metallurgy
Sidestory II - Metallurgy
Doran the blacksmith, a no-name nobody among countless blacksmiths and other patrons of his craft. One of countless veteran craftsmen of the Blacksmithing Guild of Arsalm, he and his fellow craftsmen struggled to make ends meet each and every year.
Long before the coming of Arin Rada, the lands of House Rada had seen declining business due to repeated raids, rife banditry and declining availability of raw materials on the markets. Despite this, due to the need for armed militia and city guardsmen, the arms market was kept afloat by sheer demand.
And yet, should things never change, he would be forced to migrate elsewhere, away from familiar friends and comrades and possibly exploited along with his family.
He was never happier to be more wrong.
With Arin Rada at the helm, banditry and raids were brutally crushed by an iron fist, thanks to the tireless efforts at training and fielding a strong, well-equipped professional army and rooting out corruption. Arin was a very strange boy, Doran found; armies always made do with mismatched equipment throughout Westeros. The Westerlands was the only Kingdom to ever have an army with standardised equipment, but even then there tended to be more than a little variation between levies' and knights' equipment.
Yet his insistence on standardisation would be a blessing in disguise as orders flooded in like a dam unleashing a flood. Being the generous master he was, Master Arin was willing to absorb all production costs of his guild and flooded them with all the raw material they needed. In exchange, they built that new puddling furnace which smelted both ores and scavenged old equipment into superior wrought iron.
The result was a far superior metal that was both harder and more durable and far more malleable when heated, and in far greater quantities as well, and Doran was never happier with the results; it meant that no longer did they have to rely on contracted orders, they could make equipment at any time of the year as well. Better still, they all enjoyed fatter purses with Master Arin's generous pay raises.
"Hey Doran, help me with this 'ere helmet! I swear, me hands are no good at banging them round shapes!"
Blane was a rough man, his skin bearing countless scars and his voice hoarse from relentless shouting, the by-product of years of working in a noisy workshop. Intimidating and overbearing, he easily terrified many younger apprentices scurrying around the workshop.
"Just one moment!"
Doran quenched his own sword in water, dousing the hot metal after the second round of tempering, before moving to help his senior beat the metal into the shape of a helmet.
"Isn't it easier to work this new wrought iron?" Doran questioned, "I find it hard to believe a real master like you struggles with this simple stuff."
"Oh, shove it up your arse, boy," Blane argued, "I've been working this 'ere workshop 'fore you were born!"
"Uh huh. Alright, and why ask my help then, oh venerable elder?" Doran questioned.
"Ah, shut it," Blane bit back.
"Yeah yeah, sure," Doran rolled his eyes, his lips curling into a smirk.
"I swear, now that this's easier to beat, I'm having a hard time? Working that old wrought iron seemed easier for me…"
Doran definitely did not hear that. Nope, none at all, or Blane would give him no end of complaining, he believed with a smirk.
"Oi, stop giggling to yourself," Blane said.
"I wasn't," Doran replied.
"Yes, you were," Blane pointed out.
"Really? You sure you can hear me through all this noise?" Doran questioned, "Maybe an old man like you needs a break from work."
"I'm only fifty-and-seven, you pup!"
Doran smirked in full view of Blane, and he relished the look of annoyance on his senior's face.
Just another day at work.
IIOII
Excrept from 'The Rise of House Rada', by Master Annalist Tycella Ferazon, 822 AC
Long before the Andals first came to Westeros, the First Men knew the basics of metallurgy, smelting copper and tin to make bronze. In their wars against the Children of the Forest, their bronze weaponry was stronger and more durable than the dragonglass daggers their opponents wielded, and combined with their superior numbers, sent them into flight more than once.
When the Andals came, they brought with them the art of ironmaking, taught to them by the Rhoynar of old. It was their superior technology which allowed them to best the First Men's bronze weaponry, and many nobles who sought to advance their own power, willingly converted to the Faith of the Seven and took Andal spouses to gain access to this technology.
Thus was how the Andals dominated the entirety of Westeros, save in the North who entered into splendid isolation for much of its history.
When Arin Rada first began implementing measures to better the livelihoods of his people, one such improvement was in metallurgy in the form of the puddling furnace. Most times, iron was smelted in bloomery furnaces, which had to be cracked open to remove the smelted iron within and could only produce smaller amounts each time.
At times, pig iron - a highly inferior form of iron - was considered useless and often discarded to be resmelted. The puddling furnace turned that pig iron into wrought iron, a far more malleable form of bar iron which could then be reworked by blacksmiths into a variety of weapons, armour and other tools.
To give a basic rundown of how the puddling furnace works, the furnace itself is first prepared by painting the furnace interior - the grate and the walls around it - with substances called iron oxides (usually haematite) to keep the metal from burning through the furnace. The iron is then placed in the hearth and then heated until the top melts, allowing for the oxides to begin mixing in around half an hour. During this time, the mixture is subject to strong currents of air and stirred by long bars with hooks - called puddling bars or rabbles - through doors in the furnace.
More fuel is then added and the temperatures rise, and the slag puffs up on top as the mixture is brought to a boil, which is quickly separated from the boiling metal before it is finally cast into moulds to cool down.
The extreme heat, fumes and strenuous labour involved often meant that labourers had short life expectancies, living up to their thirties at most, but it pioneered future advances in metallurgy as large, appreciable quantities of wrought iron could now be produced to equip armies and craftsmen on a larger scale. Through exchange of knowledge with House Targaryen (as they would allow) the puddling furnace was subject to further refinements, and they could now produce wrought steel in large quantities.
Steel was suddenly more readily available at cheaper prices, and weapons and armour and all kinds of metal implements from tools to cutlery were supplied in larger quantities. This formed the foundation of House Rada's superior industry and military, and all who faced them in battle spoke in hushed, fearful tones of the gleaming silver phalanxes, legionnaires and cataphracts of House Rada, and of the silver lances fired from their ballistae on land and at sea.
It would also serve as the foundation for the Arsalm Converter - named for the town it was pioneered in - the first ever crucible smelter made for large-scale steel manufacture, which was not only far safer to operate but far more efficient as well, and the method which would eventually phase out the puddling furnace as the mainstay metal production method.
Of course, after several centuries the Arsalm Converter process would gradually fade into obsolescence as the new open hearth furnace was developed, capable of smelting even greater quantities of metal ores to an even higher purity despite the increased fuel costs from needing to warm up for a few hours before it can fully function.
Still, the contributions of the puddling furnace and the Arsalm Converter cannot be forgotten - pivotal milestones in the march of progress and the pioneer of advanced metallurgical sciences.
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