Don't take this as gospel on this subject, but this is my understanding. Damascus is a name of steel, made originally in (unexpectedly) a city named Damascus. Damascus stee
…l was supposedly created by a combination of folding two different types of steel together, and folding the two steels over and over again, creating many layers that combined the properties of the two used steels. This steel was supposedly the strongest steel ever known; it was legendary. The secret was the supposed combination of the iron and carbon which created small tubes of reinforced carbon bonded with the ferrous iron, creating exceptionally tough steel in which the long tubes would be able to bend without breaking, creating exceptionally strong (and therefore very sharp and hard) steel but without sacrificing the flexibility of the weapon so it was not brittle. The technique of creating Damascus steel has been lost for centuries; I know that sound like a load of crap, but we seriously have no idea what happened to the creation technique. People may claim that we now have found a way to "recreate" damascus steel, but it's merely an imitation. We are guessing how and why the steel was both so strong and flexible, and that's kinda where we're at. A damascus gun is a gun which has parts made of damascus, most frequently the barrel. It is also an uncommon slang term; a "damascus" gun is sometimes used as a way to describe a gun which is match-grade or just functions extraordinarily well. It could also be used to describe a piece which has been heavily modified to improve on its quality. ( Full Answer )