Fire-Eaters: Blacksmiths and the Products of the Forge in Pre-Colonial Zambia

Fire-Eaters: Blacksmiths and the Products of the Forge in Pre-Colonial Zambia
ISBN-10
1524594415
ISBN-13
9781524594411
Series
Fire-Eaters
Category
Education
Pages
508
Language
English
Published
2017-01-13
Publisher
Xlibris Corporation
Author
Mwelwa C. Musambachime

Description

As late as the beginning of the nineteenth century, despite the many years of direct contact with European traders and the influx of European goods, most African societies still produced their own iron and its products, or obtained them from neighbouring communities through local trade. The quality of iron products was such that, despite competition from European imports, local iron production survived into the early twentieth century in some parts of the continent. The production process covered prospecting, mining, smelting, and forging. Different types of ore were available all over the continent and were extracted by shallow or alluvial mining. A variety of skills were required for building furnaces, producing charcoal, smelting, and forging iron into goods. Iron production was generally not an enclave activity but a process that fulfilled the totality of socio-economic needs. It also fit the gender division of labour within communities.

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