A lecture given by by Fabio Miani, at the Adventures in the Physical Metallurgy of Steels (APMS) conference held in Cambridge University. On the synthesis of various carbides of iron, beginning with elemental powders. Mechanochemical synthesis by simple milling devices has proved to be an efficient experimental tool for the synthesis of nanosized iron carbides. Along with the milling action, which is basically affected by the specific chemistry, ball to powder ratio and milling times, simple low temperature thermal cycles are effective to stabilize structure and promote/dissolve specific phases. Some collected data by transmission Mössbauer spectroscopy will be presented, along with some considerations - by means of the analysis of the hyperfine field distribution - that will be proposed on the kinetics of the formation of iron carbides at the initial atomic composition Fe 5% C 95 %, which - to the knowledge of the authors has not been discussed before.