Editing Wrought iron (section)

===Bloomery process===
{{Main|Bloomery}}

Wrought iron was originally produced by a variety of smelting processes, all described today as "bloomeries". Different forms of bloomery were used at different places and times. The bloomery was charged with [[charcoal]] and iron ore and then lit. Air was blown in through a [[tuyere]] to heat the bloomery to a temperature somewhat below the melting point of iron. In the course of the smelt, slag would melt and run out, and [[carbon monoxide]] from the charcoal would reduce the ore to iron, which formed a spongy mass (called a "bloom") containing iron and also molten silicate minerals (slag) from the ore. The iron remained in the solid state. If the bloomery were allowed to become hot enough to melt the iron, carbon would dissolve into it and form pig or cast iron, but that was not the intention. However, the design of a bloomery made it difficult to reach the melting point of iron and also prevented the concentration of carbon monoxide from becoming high.<ref name="Tylecote1992" />{{rp|46–57}}

After smelting was complete, the bloom was removed, and the process could then be started again. It was thus a batch process, rather than a continuous one such as a blast furnace. The bloom had to be forged mechanically to consolidate it and shape it into a bar, expelling slag in the process.<ref name="Tylecote1992" />{{rp|62–66}}

During the [[Middle Ages]], water-power was applied to the process, probably initially for powering bellows, and only later to hammers for forging the blooms. However, while it is certain that water-power was used, the details remain uncertain.<ref name="Tylecote1992" />{{rp|75–76}} That was the culmination of the direct process of ironmaking. It survived in [[Spain]] and southern [[France]] as Catalan Forges to the mid 19th century, in [[Austria]] as the ''stuckofen'' to 1775,<ref name="Tylecote1992" />{{rp|100–101}} and near [[Garstang]] in England until about 1770;<ref>{{cite book |author=Richard Pococke|author-link=Richard Pococke |title=The travels through England&nbsp;... during 1750, 1751, and later years |editor=J.J. Cartwright |publisher=Camden Soc. n.s. 42, 1888 |page=13 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=W. |last=Lewis |title=The Chemical and Mineral History of Iron |type=manuscript at Cardiff Central Library |year=1775 |pages=iv, 76}}</ref> it was still in use with [[hot blast]] in [[New York (state)|New York]] in the 1880s.<ref>{{cite periodical |first=G.C. |last=Pollard |title=Experimentation in 19th-century bloomery iron production: Evidence from the Adirondacks of New York |periodical=Historical Metallurgy |edition=32nd |issue=1 |year=1998 |pages=33–40}}</ref> In [[Japan]] the last of the old ''[[tatara (furnace)|tatara]]'' bloomeries used in production of traditional [[tamahagane]] steel, mainly used in swordmaking, was extinguished only in 1925, though in the late 20th century the production resumed on a low scale to supply the steel to the artisan swordmakers.