The Medieval Roots of Colonial Iron Manufacture Technology

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Brigitte Weinsteiger, Penn State Medieval Studies Program

Introduction | Medieval Iron | Medieval Blacksmith | Colonial Iron | Colonial Blacksmith | Conclusion

Europe, between the eleventh and sixteenth centuries, saw an unprecedented surge in iron manufacture technology that would quickly spread throughout the western world, including the American colonies. Although often deemed a stagnant and uninventive period, the Middle Ages, on the contrary, gave birth to a wealth of technological innovation that would long remain particularly suited to the needs of colonial American iron workers. Economic, technical and, most importantly, natural resources in the colonies made the medieval method of iron manufacture distinctively attractive and efficient, as opposed to the strikingly different method used concurrently in early modern Europe. Owed to the Middle Ages are two vital technological innovations that abounded in the American colonies, the blast furnace and the application of waterpower to almost every stage of the iron manufacture process. The blast furnace used waterpower to increase draft and, therefore, temperature, allowing iron to be smelted much faster, cheaper and with the option of creating cast or wrought iron. In addition to powering the bellows of the blast furnace, waterpower was also applied to numerous other applications, including the washing and grinding of iron ore, the drainage of mines, the wire-drawing mill, the slitting mill, and the tilt-hammer. The discussion of the development of this technology in the Middle Ages and its similar adaptation in the colonies is the goal of this essay.