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Wrought Iron: A Brief Overview
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Hundreds of detailed Ironware books exist, what Merritts.com is providing here is a
broad-brush introduction. Ironware is a vitally important part of human history, and
of the antique world. Merritt’s Antiques has many, unique Ironware antiques. Here,
Merritts.com will very roughly define the characteristics of Ironware types and
provide a sketch of the historical origins of each. As a web site devoted to antiques
our focus will be on those creations of Ironware that fit into that general category.
Wrought Iron began with what the ancient Sumerians and Egyptians called, “from the
gods”, most likely because the earliest record of iron making was extracting the ore
from meteorites. Artifacts reflecting that process date from about 4,000BC. While
bronze remained the metal of choice, iron was used by some cultures for spearheads,
and by most as trade items substituting for gold or silver as a currency. Almost
concurrent with the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age came the
discovery that adding carbon to the smelting process of iron ore enabled the resulting
iron bars to be folded and hammered into shapes creating wrought iron (worked iron).
Later, this iron was made less brittle by heating it over charcoal rather than wood
and then quenching it in water, making wrought iron harder than the Bronze it replaced.
Similar beginnings and refinements in the manufacture of wrought iron have been found
in China and India. Throughout the remaining several thousand years, smelters sprang up
throughout Europe and England giving rise to an entire new class of journeyman: the
blacksmith, so called because of the soot stains they bore from the charcoal. Wrought
iron became the metal of choice for everything from fences and hinges to armor,
cannonballs, and swords throughout Europe. The methodology for smelting, folding,
hammering and quenching were brought to America by the early settlers. Smelters
sprang up through the wooded countryside of Pennsylvania and New England, near
streams for water and woods for making charcoal. [An excellent example of a restored
iron-making facility can be found at Hopewell Furnace State Park not far from
Merritt’s Antiques.] Since the furnaces ran continuously, workers lived near the
smelters, producing the infamous company towns and company stores of the 19th century.
Blacksmiths not only hammered horseshoes which we have seen often in Westerns, but
also made tools for construction and farming, many of which survive today as antiques,
and some continue to be used by Amish and Mennonite farmers in their communities.
Fencing of wrought iron still surrounds many older homes, though more recently
blackened steel is used to resemble the older wrought iron fences. Most of these
fences are of American manufacture, the wrought iron fences of England having been
melted down for military purposes during World War II. Andirons, with or without brass
ornamentation, represent an extensive group of surviving antique wrought iron. A large
variety of cooking utensils are also available, ranging from griddles, frying pans,
drip pans, cake molds and meat hooks to such small items as pie shell crimpers and
trivets.
Browse our selection of ironware.
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