One of the treasures in Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s tomb from 1323 BC was a knife with an iron blade. The Egyptians did not know how to extract iron from iron ore, so they had only one source for the hard metal: meteorites.
One of the treasures found in Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s tomb, dating to 1323 BC, was a knife with an iron blade. However, iron is rarely found in excavations from ancient Egypt.
The Egyptians did not know how to extract iron from iron ore, so they had only one source of the hard metal: meteorites.
Some of these solid bodies from space contain pure iron, which Egyptian blacksmiths were able to hammer into tools at the forge.
Meteorites are rare, however—and only about six percent of them contain iron—so the metal was available only in very limited quantities.
As a result, knives like the one buried with Tutankhamun were regarded as princely treasures, and the Egyptians most likely viewed meteorites as gifts from the gods to the pharaoh.
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