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British Bronze Age Sword Testing


svensson

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Something this clip does not say, and I think is a mistake, is that one activity that will damage a blade as much as warfare... TRAINING.

Gallic/Celtic warriors practiced often as a demonstration of their skill and to justify their social place. After a certain point in their training, they stopped training with wooden weapons and started training with they weapon on their hip. Bashing about on shield rims and sword parries will naturally leave imperfections on a bronze blade that look exactly like those of warfare.

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9 hours ago, Geoff R Evil said:

Luckily the bronze from the bones of the gods is nothing like bronze of today, it’s obviously way stronger, even gloranthan iron is only half again as strong. When modern day steel meets modern day bronze it cuts through it as if it was claggy clay.

Modern day steel varies greatly in its material properties. Corrosion resistant steel needn't make better blades than spring steel, normal building steel (carbon steel) is hardly different from ancient carbonized iron worked properly (complete removal of slag after allowing oxidation of phosphorous, e.g. as described in Wayland's Saga using bird dung as source for nitrate). The main reason why bronze was slowly replaced by steel was the limited availability of bronze, especially after the royal trade connections based on mutual tribute had been disrupted and local copper deposits had been mined out.

While bronze is softer, I wonder whether there are any sources showing destructive tests with such blades that even resemble "claggy clay" properties. Softness doesn't necessarily mean a disadvantage, it is hard and brittle portions of a blade that break or shatter upon violent contact. And classic hoplites and early legionaries also wore bronze cuirasses and helmets against steel weapons.

Bronze and copper can be hardened by cold hammering, resulting in harder but also more brittle edges.

IMG, Godsbone bronze has growth layers of softer and harder bronze (variations of tin admixture) that cast bronze cannot have, Godsbone needs to be hammered at temperatures well beneath the melting point to retain this laminate structure which should enable thinner or longer blades than possible with cast bronze. Basically, the divine property must not be hammered or melted out of your material but carefully preserved, possibly even strengthened.

Godsbone needn't be humanoid, btw - I suppose that lammasu wing bones would be fine for lighter rapiers than you could cast.

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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IMG, I have two categories for 'bronze'...

Smelted bronze is normal everyday bronze.

God-bone bronze is an altogether superior material and has two more AP. It is highly coveted by Aldryami and Uz. While less sacred than copper or lead, its tensile strength is appreciated in armor, especially in the 'instant kill' zones of head and torso locations. God-bone bronze can be identified best on cloudy days with a white or grey light, where it shows a very subtle orange-red tinge to the overall golden-bronze coloring of item in question. Most God-bone sites have been thoroughly mined in the last 1600+ years and those sites that remain are deep in the Earth and kept VERY secret.

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That makes sense, may adopt that myself. Maybe it’s also why dwarves armour is so often superior, maybe they just have access to more godsbone? As well as superior crafting and sorcery techniques of course. What lay person would know the difference between that and smelted bronze?

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13 hours ago, Geoff R Evil said:

That makes sense, may adopt that myself. Maybe it’s also why dwarves armour is so often superior, maybe they just have access to more godsbone? As well as superior crafting and sorcery techniques of course. What lay person would know the difference between that and smelted bronze?

Dwarfs are one of the few races with access to Elder Mostali bones from the Gods War, plus they might recycle the bones from especially pious and long-lived clay dwarfs whose bones transmuted into the metal of their assigned castes. (We know that the founder of Individualism was sufficiently orthodox for his bones to turn into his assigned caste's metal.) 

We don't know much about the Gods War in the upper Underground of Glorantha, except for the troll exodus stories and the Nontrayan assault. A Journey to the Heart of the Earth by routes different from Ernalda's pathways and might contact other troglodytic cultures.

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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