ABSTRACT
In preindustrial Europe between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries iron was made by a variety of techniques and in the most diverse of social settings. At the risk of over-simplifying, direct reduction techniques were dominant in southern Europe. Coal technology made iron available in abundance. Pig iron output soared towards the end of the eighteenth century, from 61,000 tons in 1785 to 120,000 tons in 1795, then to 250,000 tons in 1805. By 1850 pig iron production in the United Kingdom stood at 2.25 million tons. The growth of bar iron output was every bit as spectacular. Seemingly limitless mineral energy and a profusion of cheap iron allowed Britain to play its pioneering role in the industrialisation of the globe. Hyde became the new orthodoxy about technological change in the iron industry, but did so at a time when the international debate over proto-industrialization theory steered scholarly interest away from questions of technology.
