De Re Metallica Part 62

1578 Ditto _Probierbuchlein Fremde Cyriacus und subtile Kunst_ Schreittmann

1580 Ditto _Probierbuchlein_ Anon.

1595 Ditto _Probierbuchlein darinn Modestin Fachs grundlicher Bericht_

1607 Dresden 4to _Metallische Probier C. C. Schindler Kunst_ _Bericht vom Ursprung und Erkenntniss der Metallischen erze_

1669 Amsterdam _Probierbuchlein darinn Modestin Fachs grundlicher Bericht_

1678 Leipzig _Probierbuchlein darinn Modestin Fachs grundlicher Bericht_

1689 Leipzig _Probierbuchlein darinn Modestin Fachs grundlicher Bericht_

1695 Nurnberg 12mo. _Deutliche Vorstellung Anon.

der Probier Kunst_

1744 Lubeck 8vo. _Neu-eroffnete Probier Anon.

Buch_

1755 Frankfurt 8vo. _Scheid-Kunstler ... Anon.

and Leipzig alle Ertz und Metalle ... probiren_

1782 Rotenburg an 8vo. _Probierbuch aus K. A. Scheidt der Fulde Erfahrung aufgesetzt_

As mentioned under the _Nutzlich Bergbuchlein_, our copy of that work, printed in 1533, contains only a portion of the _Probierbuchlein_.

Ferguson[13] mentions an edition of 1608, and the Freiberg School of Mines Catalogue gives also Frankfort, 1608, and Nurnberg, 1706. The British Museum copy of earliest date, like the t.i.tle page reproduced, contains no date. The t.i.tle page woodcut, however, in the Museum copy is referred from that above, possibly indicating an earlier date of the Museum copy.

The booklets enumerated above vary a great deal in contents, the successive prints representing a sort of growth by accretion. The first portion of our earliest edition is devoted to weights, in which the system of "lesser weights" (the principle of the "a.s.say ton") is explained. Following this are exhaustive lists of touch-needles of various composition. Directions are given with regard to a.s.say furnaces, cupels, m.u.f.fles, scorifiers, and crucibles, granulated and leaf metals, for was.h.i.+ng, roasting, and the preparation of a.s.say charges. Various reagents, including gla.s.s-gall, litharge, salt, iron filings, lead, "alkali", talc, argol, saltpetre, sal-ammoniac, alum, vitriol, lime, sulphur, antimony, _aqua fortis_, or _scheidwa.s.ser_, etc., are made use of. Various a.s.says are described and directions given for crucible, scorification, and cupellation tests. The latter part of the book is devoted to the refining and parting of precious metals. Instructions are given for the separation of silver from iron, from lead, and from antimony; of gold from silver with antimony (sulphide) and sulphur, or with sulphur alone, with "_scheidwa.s.ser_," and by cementation with salt; of gold from copper with sulphur and with lead. The amalgamation of gold and silver is mentioned.

The book is diffuse and confused, and without arrangement or system, yet a little consideration enables one of experience to understand most statements. There are over 120 recipes, with, as said before, much repet.i.tion; for instance, the parting of gold and silver by use of sulphur is given eight times in different places. The final line of the book is: "Take this in good part, dear reader, after it, please G.o.d, there will be a better." In truth, however, there are books on a.s.saying four centuries younger that are worse. This is, without doubt, the first written word on a.s.saying, and it displays that art already full grown, so far as concerns gold and silver, and to some extent copper and lead; for if we eliminate the words dependent on the atomic theory from modern works on dry a.s.saying, there has been but very minor progress. The art could not, however, have reached this advanced stage but by slow accretion, and no doubt this collection of recipes had been handed from father to son long before the 16th century. It is of wider interest that these booklets represent the first milestone on the road to quant.i.tative a.n.a.lysis, and in this light they have been largely ignored by the historians of chemistry. Internal evidence in Book VII. of _De Re Metallica_, together with the reference in the Preface, leave little doubt that Agricola was familiar with these booklets. His work, however, is arranged more systematically, each operation stated more clearly, with more detail and fresh items; and further, he gives methods of determining copper and lead which are but minutely touched upon in the _Probierbuchlein_, while the directions as to tin, bis.m.u.th, quicksilver, and iron are entirely new.

Biringuccio (Vanuccio). We practically know nothing about this author.

From the preface to the first edition of his work it appears he was styled a mathematician, but in the text[14] he certainly states that he was most of his time engaged in metallurgical operations, and that in pursuit of such knowledge he had visited Germany. The work was in Italian, published at Venice in 1540, the t.i.tle page of the first edition as below:--

[Ill.u.s.tration 614 (t.i.tle page)]

It comprises ten chapters in 168 folios demi-octavo. Other Italian editions of which we find some record are the second at Venice, 1552; third, Venice, 1558; fourth, Venice, 1559; fifth, Bologna, 1678. A French translation, by Jacques Vincent, was published in Paris, 1556, and this translation was again published at Rouen in 1627. Of the ten chapters the last six are almost wholly devoted to metal working and founding, and it is more largely for this description of the methods of making artillery, munitions of war and bells that the book is celebrated. In any event, with the exception of a quotation which we give on page 297 on silver amalgamation, there is little of interest on our subject in the latter chapters. The first four chapters are undoubtedly of importance in the history of metallurgical literature, and represent the first work on smelting. The descriptions are, however, very diffuse, difficult to follow, and lack arrangement and detail. But like the _Probierbuchlein_, the fact that it was written prior to _De Re Metallica_ demands attention for it which it would not otherwise receive. The ores of gold, silver, copper, lead, tin, and iron are described, but much interrupted with denunciations of the alchemists.

There is little of geological or mineralogical interest, he too holding to a muddle of the cla.s.sic elements astrology and alchemy. He has nothing of consequence to say on mining, and dismisses concentration with a few words. Upon a.s.saying his work is not so useful as the _Probierbuchlein_. On ore smelting he describes the reduction of iron and lead ores and cupriferous silver or gold ores with lead. He gives the barest description of a blast furnace, but adds an interesting account of a _reverbero_ furnace. He describes liquation as consisting of one operation; the subsequent treatment of the copper by refining with an oxidizing blast, but does not mention poling; the cupellation of argentiferous lead and the reduction of the litharge; the manufacture of nitric acid and that method of parting gold and silver. He also gives the method of parting with antimony and sulphur, and by cementation with common salt. Among the side issues, he describes the method of making bra.s.s with calamine; of making steel; of distilling quicksilver; of melting out sulphur; of making vitriol and alum. He states that _a.r.s.enico_ and _orpimento_ and _etrisagallio_ (realgar) are the same substance, and are used to colour copper white.

In general, Biringuccio should be accredited with the first description (as far as we are aware) of silver amalgamation, of a reverberatory furnace, and of liquation, although the description is not complete.

Also he is, so far as we are aware, the first to mention cobalt blue (_Zaffre_) and manganese, although he cla.s.sed them as "half" metals. His descriptions are far inferior to Agricola's; they do not compa.s.s anything like the same range of metallurgy, and betray the lack of a logical mind.

_Other works._ There are several works devoted to mineralogy, dating from the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, which were, no doubt, available to Agricola in the compilation of his _De Natura Fossilium_.

They are, however, practically all compiled from the jeweller's point of view rather than from that of the miner. Among them we may mention the poem on precious stones by Marbodaeus, an author who lived from 1035 to 1123, but which was first printed at Vienna in 1511; _Speculum Lapidum_, a work on precious stones, by Camilli Leonardi, first printed in Venice in 1502. A work of wider interest to mineralogists is that by Christoph Entzelt (or Enzelius, Encelio, Encelius, as it is variously given), ent.i.tled _De Re Metallica_, and first printed in 1551. The work is five years later than _De Natura Fossilium_, but contains much new material and was available to Agricola prior to his revised editions.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See pages 44 and 46.

[2] Page 75.

[3] _Der Mineralog Georgius Agricola_, Zwickau, 1889, p. 46.

[4] Andreas Moller, _Theatrum Freibergense Chronic.u.m_, etc., Freiberg, 1653.

[5] Paris, 1897, Vol. I. p. 501.

[6] Cantor Lectures, London, April 1892.

[7] Hans von Dechen, _Das alteste deutsche Bergwerksbuch_, reprint from _Zts. fur Bergrecht Bd. XXVI._, Bonn, 1885.

[8] Panzer's _Annalen_, Nurnberg, 1782, p. 422, gives an edition Worms _bei_ Peter Schofern, 1512.

[9] The Royal Library at Dresden and the State Library at Munich have each a copy, dated 1518, Worms.

[10] Hans von Decken _op. cit._, p. 48-49.

[11] _Annales typographiae augustanae ab ejus origine, MCCCLXVI. usque ad. an. M.D.x.x.x. Accedit dom Franc. Ant. Veith. Diatribe de origine ...

artis typographicae in urbe augusta vindelica edidit...._ Georgius G.

Zapf., Augsburg, 1778, X. p. 23.

[12] See p. 44.

[13] _Bibliotheca Chemica_.

[14] Book I., Chap. 2.

APPENDIX C.

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.

As stated in the preface, the nomenclature to be adopted for weights and measures has presented great difficulty. Agricola uses, throughout, the Roman and the Romanized Greek scales, but in many cases he uses these terms merely as lingual equivalents for the German quant.i.ties of his day. Moreover the cla.s.sic language sometimes failed him, whereupon he coined new Latin terms adapted from the Roman scale, and thus added further confusion. We can, perhaps, make the matter clearer by an ill.u.s.tration of a case in weights. The Roman _centumpondium_, composed of 100 _librae_, the old German _centner_ of 100 _pfundt_, and the English hundredweight of 112 pounds can be called lingual equivalents.

The first weighs about 494,600 Troy grains, the second 721,900, and the third 784,000. While the divisions of the _centumpondium_ and the _centner_ are the same, the _libra_ is divided into 12 _unciae_ and the _pfundt_ into 16 _untzen_, and in most places a summation of the units given proves that the author had in mind the Roman ratios. However, on p. 509 he makes the direct statement that the _centumpondium_ weighs 146 _librae_, which would be about the correct weight if the _centumpondium_ referred to was a _centner_. If we take an example such as "each _centumpondium_ of lead contains one _uncia_ of silver", and reduce it according to purely lingual equivalents, we should find that it runs 24.3 Troy ounces per short ton, on the basis of Roman values, and 18.25 ounces per short ton, on the basis of old German. If we were to translate these into English lingual equivalents of one ounce per hundredweight, then the value would be 17.9 ounces per short ton.

Several possibilities were open in translation: first, to calculate the values accurately in the English units; second, to adopt the nearest English lingual equivalent; third, to introduce the German scale of the period; or, fourth, to leave the original Latin in the text. The first would lead to an indefinite number of decimals and to constant doubt as to whether the values, upon which calculations were to be based, were Roman or German. The second, that is the subst.i.tution of lingual equivalents, is objectionable, not only because it would indicate values not meant by the author, but also because we should have, like Agricola, to coin new terms to accommodate the lapses in the scales, or again to use decimals. In the third case, that is in the use of the old German scale, while it would be easier to adapt than the English, it would be more unfamiliar to most readers than the Latin, and not so expressive in print, and further, in some cases would present the same difficulties of calculation as in using the English scale. Nor does the contemporary German translation of _De Re Metallica_ prove of help, for its translator adopted only lingual equivalents, and in consequence the summation of his weights often gives incorrect results. From all these possibilities we have chosen the fourth, that is simply to reproduce the Latin terms for both weights and measures. We have introduced into the footnotes such reductions to the English scale as we considered would interest readers. We have, however, digressed from the rule in two cases, in the adoption of "foot" for the Latin _pes_, and "fathom" for _pa.s.sus_. Apart from the fact that these were not cases where accuracy is involved, Agricola himself explains (p. 77) that he means the German values for these particular terms, which, fortunately, fairly closely approximate to the English. Further, we have adopted the Anglicized words "digit", "palm", and "cubit", instead of their Latin forms.

For purposes of reference, we reproduce the princ.i.p.al Roman and old German scales, in so far as they are used by Agricola in this work, with their values in English. All students of weights and measures will realize that these values are but approximate, and that this is not an occasion to enter upon a discussion of the variations in different periods or by different authorities. Agricola himself is the author of one of the standard works on Ancient Weights and Measures (see Appendix A), and further gives fairly complete information on contemporary scales of weight and fineness for precious metals in Book VII. p. 262 etc., to which we refer readers.