Indirect Reduction

A process through which steel is obtained from iron ore, used in northern France at least as early as 1451. The hotter fire of a stuckhofen would reduce the iron to a liquid, which could be collected on a bed of charcoal where a portion of the carbon would be oxidized and run off; the resulting material is steel. Also known as the Walloon method. See Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #13 .