The definitions of Damascus such as watering, damask, Oriental Damascus, layer welded Damascus, mechanized Damascus, pattern welded, etc. are varied and many but they all center around the carburization of the metal. For now, an indepth discussion is possibly connected to a noose which is connected to a millstone which will drag this thread into the abyss. On this Earth, nothing is created and nother is destroyed; only the state is changed. Many, many advances are rediscoveries of past technologies w/ innovative, new methods of accomplishing the same designed or sought after state. Much of the info we seek is twisted in a mass of forged metal. To untwist, undo, unforge would probably yield many answers and that is not possible so techniquies have to be replicated to get the end product. Upon exposure to acid, wrought iron resists better than carbon steel. The Brits weren't the first with the novel idea of adding wrought iron and probably lifted the technology from the Spanish. The Spanish possibly lifted it from the Italians who more than like lifted if from the Perisans, from whom the technique could have an origin as defined by the Perisan method for making crucible steel, who were watching the Indians but couldn't recreate the same steel. The Persians could have observed someone else. Here is where the true definition of Damascus has its origin in being from a single homogeneous source. So the Indians were privy to a raw material that just happened to possess a carbon content that after smelting was close to the sought after quality that was developed and forged the path for the industrial revolution as far as carbon content. The term Damascus has been used loosely but is directly tied to a homogeneous single source that upon exposure to acid yields a watered surface pattern.
Kind Regards,
Raimey
rse
Last edited by ellenbr; 04/29/08 07:15 AM.
