Bronze Age Greek Elites Wore Rings Forged From Meteorites
Long before the Iron Age properly began, a small circle of Minoan and Mycenaean elites appear to have worn rings made from a genuinely otherworldly material: iron that fell from the sky.
A Question Five Years in the Answering
Recent research published in the Journal of Archaeological Science has revealed the presence of meteoritic iron rings in richly furnished Greek Bronze Age tombs. According to Matthieu Gounelle, co-author of the study, these exceptionally rare pieces of jewelry may have served as coveted symbols of power within Minoan and Mycenaean society.
“This is the first time we have clearly identified objects made from meteoritic iron in Greece,” said Gounelle, a professor at France’s National Museum of Natural History attached to the Institute of Mineralogy, Materials Physics, and Cosmochemistry, at the conclusion of five years of research. The practice of crafting objects from meteoritic iron had already been documented among other civilizations of the same era, most famously the meteoritic iron dagger found in the sarcophagus of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, who died around 1450 BCE. Until this study, however, no such artifacts had ever been confirmed on Greek territory. Working with Professor Eleni Mantzourani of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Gounelle was able to show that such objects did indeed exist as far back as the Bronze Age, and that they were likely reserved for the elite of Minoan and Mycenaean society.
Two Civilizations, One Discovery
The Minoan civilization, named after the legendary King Minos, developed primarily on Crete, Santorini, and several neighboring islands between roughly 2700 and 1200 BCE. The Mycenaean civilization, named for the powerful city of Mycenae in the present-day Peloponnese, developed between approximately 1650 and 1100 BCE. Organized around powerful palaces and a warrior aristocracy, the Mycenaeans are especially known for their richly furnished tombs, their trade connections across the Mediterranean, and the involvement of Mycenaean princes in the legendary Trojan War.
Sorting Sky Metal From Earth Metal
To reach their conclusions, Gounelle and Mantzourani analyzed nearly a hundred iron objects recovered from 33 archaeological sites spread across Crete, the Peloponnese, the Aegean islands, and mainland Greece. Dated to between 1800 and 1000 BCE, these jewelry pieces, weapons, and assorted objects were examined using X-ray fluorescence spectrometry, a non-destructive technique, to determine their chemical composition.
The results: of the 91 iron objects analyzed, the large majority contained no nickel, consistent with ordinary terrestrial iron, whether produced locally or imported. Thirteen objects, however, showed a significant nickel content. For Gounelle, that distinction matters a great deal. “This element is a good indicator of the material’s extraterrestrial origin, since meteoritic iron naturally contains substantial proportions of nickel,” he explained. “This origin is all the more likely given that producing iron from nickel-rich ores is a highly complex process, particularly at a time when ironworking was still in its infancy.” According to the researcher, this meteoritic iron may have arrived through trade with Egypt, a region well suited to the discovery of meteorites thanks to its desert terrain.
Jewelry for a Very Small Circle
More striking still, with one exception, every single nickel-rich object identified in the study belonged to the same category: rings, and all of them were recovered from richly furnished Minoan and Mycenaean tombs. “This funerary context suggests that these rings were worn by prominent individuals or members of an elite, likely because it was already understood at the time that this material came from the sky,” Gounelle said. The find underscores just how much symbolic value meteoritic iron carried for its owners, and its potential role as a marker of social status within these societies.
Now held at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens and the Archaeological Museum of Heraklion in Crete, some of these rings have been described as polymetallic or finely engraved. Others were likely originally fitted with settings or ornamental additions, in the style of a signet ring. That level of craftsmanship reinforces the idea that these objects were reserved for a very small minority of Minoans and Mycenaeans.
A Fashion That Lasted a Few Centuries
Although these rings were unmistakably precious to the people who wore them, the researchers note that the practice lasted only a few centuries. Notably, roughly thirty rings analyzed from after the 13th century BCE contain no nickel at all, marking them as products of early ironworking rather than meteoritic material.
What explains the decline of these exceptional objects and the broader use of meteoritic iron? “I like the idea of a fashion trend that simply ran its course,” Gounelle said, suggesting these rings may have lost their appeal among elites independently of the material’s actual availability. A second hypothesis raised in the study points to the disruption of Mediterranean trade routes around 1200 BCE, a period that also coincides with the collapse of Mycenaean civilization.
Doubling the Known Map
Through this analysis, Gounelle and Mantzourani have doubled the number of known archaeological sites containing meteoritic iron objects. The two researchers now intend to continue their search for meteoritic iron artifacts in other countries around the eastern Mediterranean, hoping to better understand the emergence of ironworking in the region and its relationship to the earlier use of meteoritic iron. Further analysis may eventually help reconstruct the trade routes these meteorites traveled, and shed more light on the fascination this material from the sky held for people more than three thousand years ago.
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