> [!quote] [[how did nomads get metal for weapons via AskHistorians]] > We can read into the fact that Jarchi'udai carried his bellows with him, and that he's mentioned as an unremarkable member of the Uriangqai, that smiths simply slotted into ordinary nomadic society and carried their equipment with them as they moved camps. So contrary what to some other users have suggested, metallurgy wasn't too complex for nomadic societies. Metalworking equipment can easily be made portable and despite their mobility nomadic societies didn't exactly travel light; they had carts and they had a lot of animals to pull them, so there was no need to. This wasn't necessarily true of all nomadic societies of the time, though; the Mongols were somewhat isolated and cut off from contact with settled peoples at the time, so perhaps nomadic groups in closer contact with northern Chinese and Central Asian states found it easier to simply import finished metalwork. - relevant for [[Monche Nomads]] and [[Mongols]]