Figure 1Mughal dagger

Courtesy J. D. Verhoeven
Figure 2. Portrait of J N Tata, Founder of Tata Steel and
the Indian Institute of Science
Figure 3. The Materials civilisation timeline (after L E Hummel)
Figure 4. The intensity of use of materials (after M F Ashby)
Figure 5 Golden mask of Pharaoh Tutankhamen
Figure 6. Chola bronze image of Nataraja, Velankanni,
Government Museum, Chennai, ca AD 1000
Figure 7. Widmanstatten pattern in meteoritic iron. Note the beautiful
geometry of the pattern and the scale visible to the naked eye
Figure 8. Emperor Gupta looking on, as the Delhi Iron Pillar is
being completed and inscribed.
Figure 9. Cast iron pagoda from China
Figure 10. Tatara Iron Making in Japan
Courtesy T. Inoue
Figure 11 Tama-hagane- Japanese iron
made in a tatara furnace
Courtesy T. Inoue
Figure 11. Iron-carbon (Fe-C) diagram and first phase diagram of
any alloy to be established, done by Roberts-Austen in 1898 after
whom austenite is named ( redrawn from the original).
Figure 12. Historical evolution of Fe-C diagram (after J. Wadsworth)
Figure 13. Microstructures of steels (a) ferrite grains in a hypoeutectoid
steel, (b) pearlite lamellae in an eutectoid steel (c) pearlite with cementite at grain
boundaries in a hypereutectoid steel (d) martensite from Osmond
Figure 15. Sir Henry Bessemer, inventor of the Steel Converter
named after him.
Figure 16. Sketch of an Italian rapier sword
Figure 17. Greek conqueror
Alexander being presented
‘ferrum candidum’ or
bright iron by Indian king
Porus.
Figure 18. Encounter
between King Richard and
Sultan Saladin, showing off
their swords: Richard cuts a
steel bar, while Saladin
amazingly slices a pillow
with a Damascus sword of
wootz steel.
Figure 19. A view of the
fabled Hampi bazaar of the
Vijayanagara kingdom
Figure 20. A Deccan painting showing swords kept at hand
even during a romantic rendezvous
Figure 21. Shivaji with soldiers and retinue
Figure 22. Sword blades
of wootz being sheared
by the British as part of
the disarmament
drive following the
Indian Mutiny of 1857.
Figure 23 Sword of Tipu Sultan
Courtesy the Clive Museum
Figure 24. Tipu, seated
on his fabled Tiger
Throne looking at his
collection of swords,
while the sculpture-
cum-organ of the Tipu’s
Tiger with the
Englishman being
mauled, gives a
plaintive cry in the
background!.
Figure 25. A conjectural sketch of Buchanan’s furnace.
Figure 26. A sword from the Thanjavur armoury
Figure 27. A Damascus dagger found in Ootacamund
Figure 28. Michael Faraday, inventor of electricity and
investigator of wootz
Figure 29. Specimen of wootz in Science Museum, London
Figure 30 Etched structure of Wootz ingot revealing dendrites
Figure 31. The word for ironsmith (lohar) in Sanskrit as inscribe
by Michael Faraday
Figure 32. A conjecture
of Breant in the thick of
experiments, finally
exclaiming “Enfin!
(At last!), Experiment
No. 301 shows that
wootz= iron + carbon!”
alluding to the
astonishing 300 odd
experiments he did on
wootz steel.
Figure 33 Sketch of P A Anossoff, Russian Investigator
Figure 34 Sketch of N. Belaiew
Figure 35 Sketch of D. K. Tschernoff
Figure 36 Sketch of Cyril Stanley Smith
Figure 37. Superplastic flow in ultra high carbon steel (after Sherby)
Figure 38. Fine grained microstructure
Courtesy O. Sherby and J. Wadsworth)
Figure 39. Banding in V containing steels
Courtesy J. D. Verhoeven
Figure 40 Ladder pattern
Courtesy J. D. Verhoeven
Figure 41. Bladesmith Ric Fuller forging ‘Damascus ‘ blades at the
Smithsonian Folk Life Festival in Washington
Courtesy Ric Fuller
Figure 42. Sketch of Indonesian Kris
Figure 43 Steps involved in making the Samurai sword
Courtesy T. Inoue
Figure 44. Sketch of a
Japanese samurai warrior
with his sword
Figure 45 Making
Japanese samurai
swords and testing for
fatal errors'
Figure 46. Sketch of Japanese tsuba – wrought iron guards
Figure 47 Mokuma gane
Figure 48 Damask pattern
Courtesy Manfred Sachse
Figure 49 Illustration of toughening by laminate composite
Courtesy J Wadsworth
Figure 50 Wootz Crucible sites in India
After P. T. Craddock
Figure 51 Kodumanl crucibles and iron smelting debris
Figure 52 Artistic
conjecture inspired by
Sangam Tamil literature
of poetess Auvaiyar
looking on as chieftain
Anci is locked in battle
while artisans work
overtime to make
crucible steel for spears
Figure 53 Assemblage of crucibles from Mel siruvalur
Figure 54 Microstructure of a cross section of crucible from
Mel-Siruvalur showing globule of steel
Figure 55 Crucibles collected by K. N. P. Rao
Courtesy P. T. Craddock
Figure 56 Refractory of the crucible
Courtesy Thelma Lowe and Gareth Thomas
Figure 57 Iron Making in Sri Lanka (after Gill Juleff)
Figure 58 Reconstruction of Furnace used at Merv
(From Griffiths and Feuerbach, 1999)
Figure 59 Sketch of iron making by the Agarias
Figure 60 Materials Tetrahedron
 •Mechanical: Superplasticity
•High strength
Materials
•Toughness Hypertetrahedron
•Damascus Swords
Wootz Steel

Image002.gif •Ultra high carbon Steel

•Ferrite and carbide

•Crucible steel making

•Forging

15

Figure 61 Materials hypertetrahedron for Wootz steel

Figure 62 Nanowires
Courtesy W. Kochmann
Figure 63. Indentation curves
Courtesy W. Kochmann
Figure 64 Multiscale Modelling
Courtesy Greg Olson
Figure 65. Damascene Cu (Image courtesy IBM)