White Bronze
Simin Lakpour
"Sefid Ruy" Book


Manufacture of White Bronze
White Bronze is malleable between 550 and 750 degrees Celsius. Within this range, it can be hammered into any desired shape, while below red-hot temperatures it entirely loses this quality and becomes highly brittle. This is why most White Bronze vessels present sharp-edged cracks and breaches, whereas low tin content bronzes (other bronze types) are much ductile, merely becoming dented by impacts.

High tin content of these objects makes them brittle malleable, resulting in their little diversity of shapes, expected in the case of items. As concerns their manufacturing methods, White Bronze artifacts fall in two categories:

Cast Items
These objects are thicker and heavier than their hammer forged counterparts. Some have subsequently been heated and hammered, resulting in an aesthetic improvement created by the artist.

Hammered Items
These objects are thinner, lighter and simpler in shape. Occasionally, the artist has used a sharp burnishing tool on the finished object so as to obliterate the marks of his hammer blows.