Metallurgy is a domain of materials science that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their intermetallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are called alloys. It is also the technology of metals: the way in which science is applied to their practical use. Metallurgy is distinguished from the craft of metalworking.

Silver, copper, tin and meteoric iron can also be found native, allowing a limited amount of metalworking in early cultures. Egyptian weapons made from meteoric iron in about 3000 B.C. were highly prized as "Daggers from Heaven". However, by learning to get copper and tin by heating rocks and combining those two metals to make an alloy called bronze, the technology of metallurgy began about 3500 B.C. with the Bronze Age.