Technology, transformation and symbolism: ethnographic perspectives on European iron working

Abstract

Abstract Ethnographic studies provide abundant accounts of the symbolism of iron, iron making, blacksmiths, and iron products. We find the transformative aspects of iron working to be striking in these cross‐cultural studies; iron smelting is stated to be analogous to giving birth; the blacksmith's role in material transformations (ore to iron) is claimed to be a metaphoric model for social transformations rites de passage; the forging of artefacts in the smithy is said to constitute a model for conceptualization of the divine creation of the universe. In the interpretation of the iron working material in Europe little attention has been paid to symbolic, ritual and transformative significance of iron. It is the metallurgical or economic factors that have been stressed. I will in this article draw attention to the rich material, especially mythology, which we can draw on in the interpretation of the archaeological material, to get an understanding of the ideology surrounding iron production. Acknowledgements This article was written when I was on study leave at Clare Hall College, University of Cambridge during the summer of 2002. I am grateful to the college staff for their generous support. Special thanks to Gunnar Haaland for his critical and stimulating comments and also to Wendemu Lema, without whose help the strenuous fieldwork in Oska Dencha would not have been possible.