godfry n. glad

I keep running across phrases like "Bronze Age" and "Iron Age" yet I'm not sure of the history of development of metallurgical skills and suspect that they're being pushed around a lot of late.

I understood that the find of the Alpen Man in Switzerland may push back the estimated date of copper metal development by a couple thousand years. Is that right?

Can anybody recommend a decent source of information on the development of metallurgy, particularly as it relates to dating human pre-historic and historical developments? (For a lay reader, please!!)

godfry

Haran

I'm not absolutely sure, but I would say that the different "ages" might shift depending on the history of the geographical area you are talking about.

However, since I suspect your reading is related to the Bible, I think those dates are set about as well as historical "ages" can be set.

Here is a summarized table from the excellent introductory work (for the layman, since that is what you seem to be asking for) called Doing Archaeology in the Land of the Bible by John D. Currid:

Neolithic 7000-4000

Chalcolithic 4000-3200

Early Bronze Age 3200-2200

Middle Bronze Age 2200-1550

Late Bronze Age 1550-1200

Iron Age 1200-586

Persian 539-332

Hellenistic 323-37

Roman 37-AD 324

godfry n. glad

Thanks, Haran...

Actually, I was my interest was related to Zarathustra and the development of Zoroastrianism, and I was looking for a text that would discuss the development of this periodization technique and the suppositions upon which it was founded.

I'm even interested in the processes underlying the various metallurgical techniques and how their development led to paradigmatic change in material culture.

It needn't be closely related to Levantine culture, either. In my college days, I did research into the exceedingly early development of cast iron in ancient China and touched on all the necessary prerequisites for that technological innovation, so I'm not completely naive in the topic. I've just never had an overview of the periodization and how it was established and has been revised since....

godfry