The Iron Age

The Iron Age in the Ancient Near East is believed to have begun with the discovery of iron smelting and smithing techniques in Anatolia or the Caucasus in the late 2nd millennium BCE (circa 1300 BCE) [1] .

The use of iron weapons instead of bronze weapons spread rapidly throughout the Near East by the beginning of the 1st millennium BCE. Anatolians had begun forging weapons out of iron, which was a superior metal to bronze by 1500 BCE at the latest.