> Blacksmiths had a legitimately intellectual job back in the day!
ACOUP noted that blacksmiths might be assisted by unskilled laborers, strikers, who had the actual job of lifting the hammer and hitting the object with it.
ACOUP noted that blacksmiths might be assisted by unskilled laborers, strikers, who had the actual job of lifting the hammer and hitting the object with it.
Make gracious assumptions.
Digging ditches generally sucks, same as I imagine being a striker, but most anyone can do it (until their body gives out, anyway, which in some cases is 'immediately').
The only question is whether someone will pay you for doing the fancy skill/science tricks or not.
Both of those points are untrue. Strikers are unskilled labor and in general are not learning how to forge. The smith shows where he wants the hammer to fall, and they let it fall there.
https://acoup.blog/2020/10/02/collections-iron-how-did-they-...
> Things were worse for the many strikers and other laborers who were essentially unskilled hired hands or even enslaved laborers (given their depiction in artwork, it seems likely many ancient strikers were slaves) of much lower status and who could not expect to be trained into blacksmiths themselves some day. While some strikers were probably apprentices in training, it is quite clear that not all of them were! These workers would also have been far less richly paid; indeed, the entire point of strikers was to have laborers who could be paid very little but still amplify the production ability of the blacksmith himself.
(emphasis original)
Sure, it takes a ton of muscle, but you can quickly screw up a piece by repeatedly beating the hell out of it.