Abstract
The main aim of the lecture was to present the results of the ongoing research on the emergence of iron and steel technology in the Aegean during the early 1st millennium BC. The lecture emphasize the specific role the ancient region of Ionia (nowadays western Turkey and eastern Aegean islands) played in this process.
The presented date underline the importance of local technological traditions and the external impulses from the eastern part of the Mediterranean and the central Anatolia.