Making Traditional Japanese Steel (Tamahagane)

hello world we find ourselves in shiman which is located along the Sea of Japan I hear that foreign tourists don't often come here which is understandable it's a bit out of the way while I'm here today specifically in Oka isimo which is famous for its tatata Iron Works if you've ever seen princess monoke and that Iron City where they're making iron well that's a place like this minus the destroying the environment around them part of things anyways let's go check it out [Music] so the first thing you should know is that Japan is not rich in iron ore they couldn't easily pull out chunks of iron from the earth like they could in other places instead what they had was iron sand and they developed a special furnace called a tatara to smelt it into steel what's iron sand you ask it's basically what it sounds like iron that's mixed in with sand in fact I heard that if you were to go to a local River and swish around a magnet in the water you'd be able to pick out the iron okay let's see what happens oh it's coming so you can see the iron right along there I guess I was expecting like crazy amount but like the sand washes it away and this one the Sand's just all stuck but there's iron in there the iron Sands come from ancient granite rock that have worn down into grains over Millennia to harvest the iron Sands pickaxes were used to scrape off the top soil from hillsides after that it was sent winding its way down water channels and actually this is the remains of one of them in order to collect the iron sand the mixture was then separated through screens and slle [Music] boxes for in unan city you'll find the only remaining takadono in its original state a takadono is the building where the furnace to smelt iron is located this tatara is actually the model that was used in Princess monoke for their iron making Village although in the movie The Bellows were operated by multiple people at a time like in this painting however at this location it was set up for two people on opposite sides that would work hourong shifts we got a chance to try a real working model apparently I was an instant natural my sister-in-law AO on the other hand had a bit of a learning curve we left the museum to join a modern tatara experience where everyday people can try the old method of Steel making it started with building the tatara from clay using our hands we shaped both balls and bricks in this setup there's an exterior shell that provides both the shape for the tub as well as air holes [Music] here you see the finished product with the sloping sides but we're getting ahead of ourselves as an offering to the deity kanago must be given she's the female deity for iron makers fore foree practice fore foree to make the steel you need to add charcoal which not only provides the heat but the carbon that will bind to the iron and make it [Music] Steel the iron sand placed on top of the charcoal will make its way down to the bottom this process is repeated several times an hour and from start to finish takes about 24 4 hours in between adding charcoal and iron sand the workers do get a little bit of time to relax after a certain period of time slag builds up inside the tub and needs to be released this is done by unplugging the bottom and poking at it with big sticks and yes those are technical terms what you see pouring out lava like is mainly the impurities called slag the steel that's being made remains clumped inside which will be revealed shortly so hang on a little bit more this first slag is actually being collected for cooking which you'll see in a [Music] moment but most of it gets wheeled out the door and thrown into the Slag [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Pile this air blower technique by the way is very very traditional they're basically making a kind of salt emoi a rice pancake which is offered to the deity kanago and to all the workers as [Laughter] [Music] well after all day and night it's now morning and it's time to suit [Music] up traditionally the clay tub would be broken revealing the K inside but this is the modern tatara experience where we can easily Hoist the shell up the remaining charcoal is shoveled and wheelbarrow away which makes for fun Sparky [Music] times and at last the Keta is revealed [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] in case you were wondering if it was hot or not just look at what happened to this safety [Music] [Applause] helmet this is not what we made but for the regular 3-day process the steel that's made at the end is called tamahagane if you look at the kanji used the Tama means precious and the Hagan means steel so the name kind of means precious steel so this chunk is called K and from that you'll get the high quality steel the Haan but also pig iron called zuku and an iron compound containing impurities called buera I'm really amazed being part of History here period And this is handmade and you can do it yourself we did it the last 24 hours I'm going to onen now okay let's get some of this thank you did you get like a take home gift or you get we we will get that later when it when the iron is cold so yeah so we will we will get a chunk what do you have any plans for the chunk nope just going to have it like paper yeah exactly what generally happens with the high and low quality tamahagane as the sword Smith mentioned is is that it's made into swords we briefly got to try our hand at [Music] it [Music] I'm not even going to show you the footage of me trying to make a sword but I will show you what the sword Smith looks [Music] like [Music] e for for this is part of the reason why Japanese swords are so expensive not many are made because the people who can make them are limited only tamahagane can be used and the time required to make them is immense in comparison to more modern [Music] methods speee it was pretty cool to be able to pick up a real Katana although it was also a bit awkward because you really want to swing it around and cut some stuff up but can't because not only is there no sharp edge you wouldn't want to damage a museum piece we also got to practice un sheathing The Sword and were quite terrible at it no no no fore while making a knife is not nearly as complex as making a sword a lot of the processes are similar and it was fascinating to be able to take part in some of the steps we started with a steel blank and and proceeded to shape it into the blade of a [Music] [Music] knife fore spee [Music] foree fore [Music] speee fore foreign fore [Music] [Music] speeech [Music] [Music] want yog good y good you want [Music] [Music] for this car of course the last thing we had to do was the Tomato [Music] test the thing is tamaha stopped being produced in 1923 as iron could be imported more cheaply from overseas and after World War II owning swords was banned across Japan further cementing the lack of Need for tamahagane but in 1977 tamahagane production was started up once again to preserve tradition culture and art in fact unbeknownst to me my sister-in-law AO was secretly hiding a sword in her home it was a present from her sister-in-law given to protect her new home thanks for watching see you next time peace peace oh you want to what's better the katana or long sword I'm joking I really am please don't make the comment section into a war [Music] zone [Music] for

Channel: Life Where I'm From

Views: 171,318

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Id: 95ZT_opuaSA

Length: 23min 56sec (1436 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 28 2023