Iron Smelting in Madagascar; Malagasy Forge and Native Smiths
In the accompanying text, Ellis described how "their smelting furnaces. . . are always fixed near a stream, and the ore. . . is broken small, and the earth. . . removed by frequent washings. The sides of the furnaces, usually sunk two or three feet in the ground, are made of stones, covered outside with clay. . . The blast is supplied by two pairs of pistons working in wooden cylinders. . . From the bottom of each cylinder a tube, formed by a bamboo or an old gun-barrel, is inserted into a hole through the stones round the furnace. After the contents of the furnace have been kept some time at a white heat it is left to cool, and when opened the iron is found in pigs or lumps at the bottom. In this state, as well as when heated again, [it is] beaten into bars or rods" (p. 243). William Ellis (1794–1872) was an English missionary and author, who went to Madagascar on three occasions in the 1850s.
Image Title
Iron Smelting in Madagascar; Malagasy Forge and Native Smiths
RegID
SI-OB-1048
Date
1850s
Title
Iron Smelting in Madagascar; Malagasy Forge and Native Smiths
Source
William Ellis, Three visits to Madagascar during the years 1853-1854-1856 (New York, 1859; reprinted, Philadelphia, 1888), p. 294; also published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine (1858-59), vol. 18, p. 597. (Copy in Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library)
Language
English
Item sets
Pre-Colonial Africa: Society, Polity, Culture
Spatial Coverage
Africa--Madagascar
Reproduced In
William Ellis, Three visits to Madagascar during the years 1853-1854-1856 (New York, 1859; reprinted, Philadelphia, 1888), p. 294; also published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine (1858-59), vol. 18, p. 597.
Researchers
Jerome Handler; Michael Tuite; Henry B. Lovejoy Graduate Research Assistants: Tiffany Beebe; Travis May
Identifier
Ellis-294