Archaeo-Geophysical Investigation of Ife City Grand Resort Iron Smelting Site at Ile-Ife, Southwest Nigeria

What is it about?

“Ile-Ife Suspected Iron Smelting Site” is located within the estate of the Ife City Grand Resort and Leisure Centre, where pieces of iron slag, tuyere and black soils characteristic of iron smelting activity, were identified. The ancient City of Ile-Ife is believed to have hosted hundreds of iron smelting sites with no archaeological record. In order to recover buried archaeological artefacts that would enable the establishment of the smelting site, facilitate the dating of the smelting activity and establish its place in the archaeological history of Yorubaland and African region and possibly secure a portion of the estate as a heritage site, archaeo-geophysical investigation involving magnetic and electrical resistivity methods, was carried out. The geophysical investigation identified a prominent circular/oval shape dipolar magnetic anomaly which coincided with a high resistivity anomaly typical of heat (thermo) impacted furnace and slag trench. Follow-up excavation of the anomalous zone led to the recovery of artefacts/features such as pieces of iron slags, tuyere, fragments of fired clay furnace wall and charcoal. These finds are typical of an iron smelting site. The recovered charcoal dated 11th to 13th centuries, which correspond to middle to late age in the history of iron smelting in Africa. The results validated this site as one of the ancient iron smelting sites in Ile-Ife and established its place in the archaeological history of iron smelting in Africa.

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