Metallographic examination of a group of nine early iron tools and weapons of diverse origins reveals a range of production techniques. Several of the artifacts have had specially selected edges welded on, and one of the spearheads (badly damaged by corrosion) has a pattern-welded blade. Deliberate carburization to produce both local steeled areas and relatively homogenous steel, as well as heat-treatment, provides evidence of an early appreciation of the potential of the physical properties of iron and steel and of the techniques needed to manipulate these properties. After a sufficiently large number of similar examinations has been carried out, technological information should be useful in the construction of typologies of iron artifacts which at present are difficult to classify by shape alone. See also AATA 10-923, 13-701, and 16-1752. -- AATA