Slag-pit bloomery furnace of the Tarchalice type

Reconstruction and experimental research

Abstract

The paper presents the results of the first stage of experimental research on reconstruction of the bloomery process in the slag-pit furnace of the Tarchalice type. The phenomenon of bloomery furnaces from the Przeworsk culture settlement in Tarchalice (Tarxdorf), Lower Silesia, Poland, has been known to the scientific community since 1903. With regard to ancient slag-pit furnaces discovered in the second half of the twentieth century in the Świętokrzyskie Mountains and Mazovia region, these features had two-times larger diameter of slag-pits and almost four-times greater weight of slag blocks. The large sizes of the slag-pits suggested dissimilarity of conditions of running the process, formation of iron bloom and block of slag in relation to quite well known from scientific experiments the bloomery process from the Świętokrzyskie Mountains.