Iron and steel as working metals

Meaning

Iron and steel are named together in claims about quicksilver’s hostility and about protection from rust. Their conjunction preserves a practical material distinction without supplying a modern compositional account of steel. Iron also provides the body allegedly attracted by a magnet, while filings of iron or steel are proposed as the magnet’s preservative environment. The lexical family therefore crosses damage, attraction and maintenance rather than occupying only one process.