Bronze Age arrow 'speaks' 150 years after discovery: it came from outer space

An international team of experts has discovered that a Late Bronze Age arrowhead in the collections of the Bern History Museum was made of meteoritic iron. It was discovered during research between 1873 and 1874, while the other arrowheads found at the site were bronze. It has a triangular blade with a short tang. It weighs 2.9 grams and has an overall length of 39.3 mm.

Earlier research has shown that meteoric iron was used relatively frequently by people from Eurasia to the Middle East and Africa. In Europe, on the other hand, there were only a few known examples until recently. Suspecting that meteoritic iron artifacts may be among the artifacts previously found, but have not yet been...the expert team has been exploring archaeological collections in various parts of Switzerland.

Analysis of an arrowhead housed in the Bern History Museum showed that it was made partly from aluminium-26 isotopes that do not occur naturally on Earth. It also contained an iron-nickel alloy that has so far only been found in meteorites. The team found that the arrowhead was discovered at the site of a Bronze Age settlement called Mörigen, which was inhabited between 900 and 800 BC.

Remnants of pitch and tar glue were also found on the arrowhead, so the arrow was originally attached to a wooden shaft. The site of the find is only eight kilometres from the impact of the Twannberg meteorite, leading to speculation about the likely source of the iron. But on closer examination, the concentrations of germanium and nickel were found to be inconsistent and the raw material for the arrow came from a different source.

The geological database revealed that only three meteorites with the same combination of metals have so far been found in Europe: one in the Czech Republic, another in Spain and a third in Estonia. The most likely source of the arrowhead was the Estonian one - showing how extensive and vibrant trade networks operated in Central Europe during the Bronze Age.

Roman Nemec

Sources: phys.org, thehistoryblog.com, sciencedirect.com

Arrowhead made of meteoritic iron

The Mörigen arrowhead consists of rust-covered iron metal with a very distinctive laminated texture


Gamma spectrometry of the Mörigen arrow