Yes....a few years ago in fact. I even used it recently to prove my point when arguing against all the super-idiot steels that some companies and knife makers are trying to peddle, while padding their wallets....
[video=youtube;YVSsRunJ2K4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVSsRunJ2K4[/video]
It's interesting... I've seen it before, and enjoyed watching it again. I'm not sure what it really proves;
this particular blacksmith made an ingot of fairly slag-free steel, using the design of a forge discovered in Central Asia (dating roughly to the appropriate period); he then used the excellent design of the Ulfbert (sorry, '+Ulfber+t') -- and a millennium's worth of hindsight -- to make a replica.
In fact, there's more hype than actual history. A few Vikings imported and repurposed some primo Damascus steel using the Volga trade route... probably. It could have been a Frankish blacksmith or shop, judging by the name and the crosses alone, but the Ulfberts turn up in Viking grave-sites, not Frankish ones.
Whoever made the swords, and the inscription, the consensus seems to be that they
weren't the person responsible for making the high-carbon steel. It likely travelled up the Volga as raw material after being produced by one of the peoples who are well known as makers of high-carbon Damascus... so... it's no more a mystery than the Buddha that ended up in a Viking grave, or the Muslim coins.
And why is it 'mysterious' that so little is known about the blacksmith shop responsible for the Ulfbert? Outside of medieval Japan, it's pretty rare anything is
ever known about individual swordsmiths. We're talking about Scandinavia circa 800-1000 A.D. -- there was a reason they called them the Dark Ages.
All that aside... what kind of argument does this offer 'against all the super-idiot steels that some companies and knife makers are trying to peddle, while padding their wallets...'? I saw one modern steel-maker agree that the steel made in the Central Asian-style forge was 'not bad', given the tools and knowledge they possessed at the time. But I'm not sure how you managed to dig up a condemnation of 'super-idiot steel' in that documentary. You could just as easily argue the opposite, by saying that Damascus was the 'super-idiot steel' -- or powder metallurgical steel -- of the time.
I don't think 'super-steels' (I'll guess you mean PM steels like CPM S110V, M390, Vanax 75, CPM M4 or CPM 3V to 10V) are better than conventional carbon steels like 1095, 5160, and 52100, or tool steels like O1, A2 and W2. They all work very well when the maker understands the strengths and weaknesses of the steel in question, and matches it with the appropriate application; i.e., M390 might be preferable to 5160 for a folder with a 3.5-inch blade, when edge retention and corrosion resistance are prized; 5160 might be preferable to M390 for a machete, when toughness is sought above all else. There is nothing in the documentary that suggests otherwise, IMO.