No metal has been shrouded in such a flair of romance as Damascus steel. Ancient legendary peoples forged weapons from it, tyrants, dragons and mythical monsters were thrown down with the help of blades with bizarre patterns. But the method of making this miracle steel still remains unknown …
The nano-secrets of the ancient masters were solved by a Russian engineer
Damascus swords cut armor, age-old oaks, stones. Their properties are such that even a saber placed in a stream could easily cut through leaves floating in running water. The blade could be wrapped around the belt and, straightening, it fully retained its properties.
The success of the Syrian blacksmiths
Alexander the Great was able to appreciate the merits of eastern edged weapons, when his soldiers invaded the northwestern part of India and captured King Pora himself. The king survived only thanks to his steel shell, which the iron swords and spears of the Macedonians could not pierce.
According to legends, the Indians learned the ability to make extraordinary fortress steel from a tribe of blacksmiths who descended from the mountains and settled in Punjab, the most ancient principality of India.
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Ingots of cast damask in the form of chopped cakes, wutts, were brought from India to Syria, where fabulous blades were forged from them in the city of Damascus. But Indian steel was very expensive, and the Syrian blacksmiths invented their own method of metal processing. Damascus steel was obtained by multiple forging in different directions of the beam from steel rods of different hardness. The quality of damask steel blades was considered very high at that time. There is an opinion that steel was called Damascus because of the similarity of graphic images on its surface with the pattern of the famous Damascus wool and silk fabrics (in Syria they were called Damascus, in France - Damascus, in Holland - Damask).
In the Middle Ages, the secrets of metallurgy, like the professional secrets of shamans, were passed on only to initiates. It was this preservation of the secrets of blacksmithing art that led to the final loss of the technology of Damascus production, which was lost around 1750.
Drawing on steel
For centuries, there has been a belief that the quality of steel is somehow related to the pattern.
Experiments were conducted with the addition of different metals to steel in the hope of repeating the pattern. The Damascus pattern did not work, but the researchers paid attention to how different additives change its properties - they strengthen it, make it stainless. As a result, research continued, but not with the aim of repeating the damask pattern, but to study the properties of alloys with steel. Thus, the research of Damascus steel directly led to the discovery and development of alloy steels - a material without which modern civilization is unthinkable.
Only the Russian scientist, the mining director of the Zlatoust factories Anosov, managed to obtain a unique steel, not inferior in properties to the Indian Wutz. After many years of experience, he made the first Damascus blade in 1837. “The strip of steel was bent without the slightest damage, making a clear and high-pitched ringing. The polished end crumbled the best English chisels, Anosov wrote in the Gorny Zhurnal. The Anosov blade that has survived to this day cuts through nails, bends into an arc and cuts a gas scarf on the fly. It seems that the secret of Damascus steel has been revealed. But, even with the most detailed recipe left by Anosov, after his death no one managed to reproduce such a metal. It is believed that its production on a modern industrial scale is generally impossible. The manufacture of this steel requires manual labor of craftsmen,which need to be prepared for years. But even if they can make such a blade, its price will be too high. That is, the costs of its production will not cover the potential income.
Something, but they know how to count well in our time.
Discovery of German crystallographers
Recently German scientists made an unusual discovery. It turns out that ancient Indian artisans used nanotechnology in the manufacture of their blades from the legendary Damascus steel and did not even know about it. After studying the molecular structure of a 17th century saber under an electron microscope, German crystallographers discovered carbon nanotubes and nanofibers made of cementite (iron carbide) in the blade.
According to Dresden researchers, it is the inclusion of these complex elements that explains the unique properties of Damascus steel.
Scientists speculate that carbon nanotubes and nanofibers were formed in the blades through a complex process of firing and forging. And as soon as the blades were almost ready, the blacksmiths poisoned the steel with acid, applying an inimitable recognizable pattern on them.
Magazine: Mysteries of History №4. Elena Sadovaya