Looking for Ancient Metalworking Sites of Luristan (Western Iran): a Preliminary Archaeometallurgical Approach

The region of Luristan in the Zagros Mountains (western Iran) is known worldwide for its skilled and enigmatic ancient metal production, in particular its “Luristan Bronzes” dated to the Bronze and Iron Ages. At the crossroads between the IInd and Ist millennia BC, in parallel with tradition of elaborate bronze production, Luristan also saw the arrival of iron. Bimetallic bronze iron artefacts and technically well-developed iron mask swords are among very notable iron products of Luristan metalworkers and are potentially among the oldest iron artefacts known from Iran. Despite this situation, technical aspects of iron metallurgy are almost unknown in Luristan. Field investigations are rare, archaeological production contexts are unknown, and little attention has been paid to iron metalworking. This article, as an initial step in this field, will address the results of a recent short archaeometallurgical survey in Luristan which lead to the discovery of five slag heaps. The physicochemical analyses and microscopic observations, which were carried out at the Departments of Mining Archaeology and Archaeometallurgy of the German Mining Museum, Bochum (DBM), Germany, indicated that we have identified several ironworking workshops: mostly smelting together with some vestiges of smithing activities. In addition, geochemical and isotopic analyses attested that the ores probably came from geochemically similar deposits in the wider region.