Petrie at Abydos. This discovery consisted of an undoubted fragment of
iron found in conjunction with bronze tools of VIth Dynasty date; and it
settled the matter.* The VIth Dynasty date of this piece of iron, which
was more probably worked than not (since it was buried with tools), was
held to be undoubted by its discoverer and by everybody else, and, if
this were undoubted, the IVth Dynasty date of the Great Pyramid fragment
was also fully established. The discoverers of the earlier fragment had
no doubt whatever as to its being contemporary with the pyramid, and
were supported in this by Prof. Petrie in 1881. Therefore it is now
known to be the fact that iron was used by the Egyptians as early as
3500 B.C.**
* See H. R. Hall's note on "The Early Use of Iron in Egypt,"
in _Man_ (the organ of the Anthropological Society of
London), iii (1903), No. 86.
** Prof. Montelius objected to these conclusions in a review
of the British Museum "Guide to the Antiquities of the
Bronze Age," which was published in Man, 1005 (Jan.), No 7.
For an answer to these objections, see Hall, ibid., No. 40.
It would thus appear that though the Egyptians cannot be said to have
used iron generally and so to have entered the "Iron Age" before about
1300 B.C. (reign of Ramses II), yet iron was well known to them and had
been used more than occasionally by them for tools and building purposes
as early as the time of the IVth Dynasty, about 3500 B.
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