Math - Blood Longsword

Math - Blood Longsword

Redditor SecretCoyote did the math.

The average man has 4 grams of iron in his blood.
http://www.irondisorders.org/how-much-iron-is-in-the-body/

According to Wikipedia, the average British longsword was between 1.1 and 1.8 kg. We'll use 1.45, the median value.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longsword

Also according to Wikipedia, the carbon content of steel is anywhere between .002% and 2.1%. Averaged, the carbon percentage of steel is 1.051%, though I doubt the percentage was anything approaching consistent (if anyone has better numbers for that please share).
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel


So 1.45kg - (1.45kg * 1.051%) = 1.4347605kg of iron in the average longsword. At .004kg of iron in the average man, and assuming complete iron extraction from each corpse, forging a sword from blood-iron would have taken 358.69, or 359 dead men (far fewer than I expected, frankly).

TL;DR: at 359 humans, it's one damn expensive sword to make.