1
APPENDIX B.
ANCIENT AUTHORS.
We give the following brief notes on early works containing some reference to
miner
alogy, mining, or metallurgy, to indicate the literature
available to Agricola and for historical
notes bearing upon the
subject.
References to these works in the footnotes may be most
easily consulted
through the personal index.
GREEK AUTHORS.—Only a very limited Greek literature upon subjects
allied to
mining or natural science survives.
The whole of the material of technical interest could be
reproduced on
less than twenty of these pages.
Those of most importance are: Aristotle
(384-322 B.C.), Theophrastus
(371-288 B.C.), Diodorus Siculus (1st Century B.C.), Strabo
(64
B.C.—25 A.D.), and Dioscorides (1st Century A.D.).
Aristotle, apart from occasional mineralogical or metallurgical references in
De Mira
bilibus, is mostly of interest as the author of the Peripatetic theory of the
elements and the
relation of these to the origin of stones and metals.
Agricola was, to a considerable measure,
a follower of this school, and
their views colour much of his writings.
We, however, discuss
elsewhere1
at what point he departed from them.
Especially in De Ortu et Causis does he
quote largely from Aristotle's Meteorologica, Physica, and De Coelo on these subjects.
There
is a spurious work on stones attributed to Aristotle of some
interest to mineralogists.
It was
probably the work of some Arab early in the Middle Ages.
Theophrastus, the principal disciple of Aristotle, appears to have written at
least two
works relating to our subject—one “On
Stones”, and the other on metals, mining or metal
lurgy, but
the latter is not extant.
The work “On Stones” was first printed in Venice in
1498,
and the Greek text, together with a fair English translation by Sir John
Hill, was
published in London in 1746 under the title
“Theophrastus on Stones”; the translation is,
however,
somewhat coloured with Hill's views on mineralogy.
The work comprises 120
short paragraphs, and would, if reproduced, cover
but about four of these pages.
In the
first paragraphs are the Peripatetic view of the origin of stones
and minerals, and upon the
foundation of Aristotle he makes some
modifications.
The principal interest in Theophrastus'
work is the description of
minerals; the information given is, however, such as might be
pos
sessed by any ordinary workman, and betrays no particular
abilities for natural philosophy.
He enumerates various exterior characteristics, such as colour, tenacity,
hardness, smooth
ness, density, fusibility, lustre, and
transparence, and their quality of reproduction, and then
proceeds to
describe various substances, but usually omits his enumerated
characteristics.
Apart from the then known metals and certain “earths” (ochre,
marls, clay, etc.), it is possible
to identify from his descriptions
the following rocks and minerals:—marble, pumice, onyx,
gypsum,
pyrites, coal, bitumen, amber, azurite, chrysocolla, realgar, orpiment,
cinnabar,
quartz in various forms, lapis lazuli, emerald, sapphire,
diamond, and ruby.
Altogether there
are some sixteen distinct mineral species.
He also describes the touchstone and its uses, the
making of white-lead
and verdigris, and of quicksilver from cinnabar.
Diodorus Siculus was a Greek native of Sicily.
His “historical library” consisted of
some 40 books, of
which parts of 15 are extant.
The first print was in Latin, 1472, and in
Greek in 1539; the first
translation into English was by Thomas Stocker, London, 1568, and
later
by G. Booth, 1700. We have relied upon Booth's translation, but with some
amend
ments by friends, to gain more literal statement.
Diodorus, so far as relates to our subject,
gives merely the occasional
note of a traveller.
The most interesting paragraphs are his
quotation from Agatharchides on
Egyptian mining and upon British tin.
Strabo was also a geographer.
His work consists of 17 books, and practically all
survive.
We have relied upon the most excellent translation of Hamilton and Falconer,
London, 1903, the only one in English.
Mines and minerals did not escape such an acute
geographer, and the
matters of greatest interest are those with relation to Spanish mines.
Dioscorides was a Greek physician who wrote entirely from the standpoint of
materia
medica, most of his work being devoted to herbs; but Book V. is
devoted to minerals and
rocks, and their preparation for medicinal
purposes.
The work has never been translated
into English, and we have relied upon
the Latin translation of Matthioli, Venice, 1565, and notes
upon the
Greek text prepared for us by Mr.
C. Katopodes.
In addition to most of the sub
stances known before, he, so far as
can be identified, adds schist, cadmia (blende or calamine),
chalcitis (copper sulphide), misy, melanteria, sory (copper
or iron sulphide oxidation minerals).
He describes the making of
certain artificial products, such as copper oxides, vitriol, litharge,
pompholyx, and
spodos (zinc and / or
arsenical oxides). His principal interest for us, however,
lies in the
processes set out for making his medicines.
Occasional scraps of information relating to the metals or mines in some
connection
are to be found in many other Greek writers, and in
quotations by them from others which are
not now extant, such as
Polybius, Posidonius, etc.
The poets occasionally throw a gleam