Bronze
Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper. The addition of other metals, produces an alloy much harder than plain copper. The historical period where the archeological record contains many bronze artifacts is known as the Bronze Age. Because historical pieces were often made of brasses and bronzes with different compositions, modern museum and scholarly descriptions of older objects increasingly use the more inclusive term "copper alloy" instead. The word
bronze is borrowed from French
bronze, itself borrowed from Italian
bronzo "bell metal, brass" , from either: ▪ Ravenna *
bróntion, back-formation from Byzantine Greek
brontēsíon, perhaps from
Brentḗsion ‘Brindisi’, reputed for its bronze; or ▪ early Persian
birinj,
biranj "brass",
piring "copper", from which also came Serbo-Croatian
pìrinač "brass", Georgian
brinǰao "bronze", Armenian
płinj "copper".