With the Iron Age that was to follow, we got tools like the plow, sickle, and civilization as we know it.
Whether you want to forge an axe or something else, you will need 4 basic things for the setup:
Steel melts at 2750 degrees F. That is a high temperature! Luckily, you don’t need to get your forge that hot. You want to keep the temperature under 2500 degrees F for steel so it doesn’t just liquefy on you.
You’ll need a pair of strong grips or tongs for holding the metal you are forging into an axe. You don’t want your tongs to start melting when they touch the scrap metal you are working on!
Some people just hold the scrap metal with gloved hands, but that only works if you’ve got a long piece of metal so the end you are holding isn’t transferring heat from the furnace. In short, you’ll need tongs to make your axe.
An anvil is what you put your metal on top of while working on it. The anvil needs to be very heavy to withstand all the hammering you will do on top of it.
You’ll need this to bang the heated scrap metal into the desired shape. Anything else which is strong and applies force will also work.