The Ancient Xingyang Iron Smelting Site

The Ancient Xingyang Iron Smelting Site

The Ancient Xingyang Iron Smelting Site is a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

The Ancient Xingyang Iron Smelting Site is located outside the west wall of the Han Dynasty Xingyang City, approximately 27 kilometers northwest of Zhengzhou. The site stretches 400 meters from north to south and 300 meters from east to west, covering a total area of 120,000 square meters. It was the No. 1 workshop of the Henan Commandery's Iron Office, referred to as "He Yi" for short, and is currently the largest and earliest iron smelting site discovered in the world. During two excavations at the Han Dynasty iron smelting site in Guxing Town (1965 and 1975), the remains of two large Han Dynasty iron-smelting blast furnaces were uncovered, along with wells, water pools, boat-shaped pits, four-cornered column pits, pottery kilns, and more. Artifacts unearthed include clay tuyeres, refractory bricks, pottery molds used for casting iron molds, as well as 318 ironware items, over 380 pottery items, 8 stone tools, and more than 10 large iron chunks, the heaviest of which weighs 23 tons.

The two large iron-smelting blast furnace remains stand side by side from east to west, 14.5 meters apart. The furnace foundations are 3 meters deep, with oval-shaped furnace hearths covering an area of 8.5 square meters and furnace walls 1 meter thick. Among them, the No. 1 oval vertical furnace has a volume of up to 50 cubic meters, making it the largest ancient iron-smelting furnace discovered in China to date, with an estimated daily output of 0.5 to 1 ton, and also the largest blast furnace in the world at that time. In contrast, circular blast furnaces did not appear in the West until the mid-16th century, making this a true marvel in the history of global iron smelting. The metallurgical techniques discovered in the Zhengzhou area represent the highest level of metallurgical craftsmanship in China during the Han Dynasty and were far ahead of their time on a global scale.

Among the 318 unearthed ironware items, there are 206 agricultural tools such as plows, plowshares, shovels, hoes, concave mattocks, mattocks, picks, and double-toothed picks; 5 hand tools such as adzes, chisels, and hammers; 9 hexagonal bearings and gears; and more than 10 agricultural tools inscribed with the marking "He Yi." This workshop was massive in scale. In addition to smelting large quantities of pig iron, it also cast agricultural and hand tools such as shovels, adzes, and picks using pig iron, and produced a large number of iron molds. This indicates that during the Han Dynasty, iron had been widely applied in both agricultural and handicraft production, leading to unprecedented development in productivity.

Travel Tips:

Phone: 0371-63591024

Opening Hours: 8:30–17:30

Admission: Free

Address: Guxing Town, Huiji District, Zhengzhou City

Transportation: Take bus route 322 to get there

Postal Code: 450043

Further Reading:

· Fifth Batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units