Although Wootz/Balat/Crucible steel is not pattern welded, it may have been the inspiration for damascus steel, and found some neat reading here including the report of Maj. General Pavel Anossoff on "Bulat"
From
http://met.iisc.ernet.in/~rangu/text.pdf "Wootz...was coined when European travellers from the 17th century onward came across the making of steel by crucible processes in Southern India in the present day states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka. Wootz was the Anglicization of 'ukku', the Kannada word for steel."
“Wootz was the first high-quality steel
made anywhere in the world. According
to reports of travelers to the East,
the Damascus swords were made
by forging small cakes of steel that
were manufactured in Southern India.
This steel was called wootz steel.
It was more than a thousand years before
steel as good was made in the West.”
-J. D. Verhoeven and A. Pendray,
Muse, 1998
