The earliest records of bloomery-type furnaces in East Africa are discoveries of smelted iron and carbon in Nubia n ancient Sudan dated at least to the seventh to the sixth century BC. The ancient bloomeries that produced metal tools for the Nubians and Kushites produced a surplus for sale. All traditional sub-Saharan African iron-smelting processes are variants of the bloomery process. There is considerable discussion about the origins of iron metallurgy in Africa. Smelting in bloomery type furnaces in West Africa and forging of tools appeared in the Nok culture of central Nigeria by at least 550 BC and possibly several centuries earlier. Also, evidence indicates iron smelting with bloomery-style furnaces dated to 750 BC in Opi (Augustin Holl 2009) and Lejja dated to 2,000 BC (Pamela Eze-Uzomaka 2009), both sites in the Nsukka region of southeast Nigeria in what is now Igboland. The site of Gbabiri, in the Central African Republic, has also yielded evidence of iron metallurgy, from a reduction furnace and blacksmith workshop, with earliest dates of 896–773 and 907–796 BC, respectively.