This week on the blog: wootz in South Asia and cast iron in China - other ways iron and steel were produced in the pre-modern world!https://acoup.blog/2020/11/06/collections-iron-how-did-they-make-it-addendum-crucible-steel-and-cast-iron/ …
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Interesting article, thank you! I wonder if you have a sense of why the Wootz process didn't spread westward into the Middle East and into Europe? You talk about some Islamic writers & the process spreading in the 12th century, but did it go farther from there? Or spread earlier?
The technical hurdles are pretty high. You need very hot furnaces and then you need crucibles that can withstand that very high heat. That said, the Indian crucible method does seem to get to Europe in the 1700s, by which time the furnaces are hot enough to do it.