[Pg 22][28] Jurati Venditores—"Sworn brokers." (?)
[Pg 23][29] There is no doubt that Thucydides had some connection with gold mines; he himself is the authority for the statement that he worked mines in Thrace. Agricola seems to have obtained his idea that Thucydides held an appointment from the Athenians in charge of mines in Thasos, from Marcellinus (Vita, Thucydides, 30), who also says that Thucydides obtained possession of mines in Thrace through his marriage with a Thracian woman, and that it was while residing on the mines at Scapte-Hyle that he wrote his history. Later scholars, however, find little warrant for these assertions. The gold mines of Thasos—an island off the mainland of Thrace—are frequently mentioned by the ancient authors. Herodotus, VI., 46-47, says:—"Their (the Thasians') revenue was derived partly from their possessions upon the mainland, partly from the mines which they owned. They were masters of the gold mines of Scapte-Hyle, the yearly produce of which amounted to eighty talents. Their mines in Thasos yielded less, but still were so prolific that besides being entirely free from land-tax they had a surplus of income derived from the two sources of their territory on the mainland and their mines, in common years two hundred and in best years three hundred talents. I myself have seen the mines in question. By far the most curious of them are those which the Phoenicians discovered at the time when they went with Thasos and colonized the island, which took its name from him. [Pg 24]These Phoenician workings are in Thasos itself, between Coenyra and a place called Aenyra over against Samothrace; a high mountain has been turned upside down in the search for ores." (Rawlinson's Trans.). The occasion of this statement of Herodotus was the relations of the Thasians with Darius (521-486 B.C.). The date of the Phoenician colonization of Thasos is highly nebular—anywhere from 1200 to 900 B.C.
[30] Agricola, De Veteribus et Novis Metallis, Book I., p. 392, says:—"Conrad, whose nickname in former years was 'pauper,' suddenly became rich from the silver mines of Mount Jura, known as the Firstum." He was ennobled with the title of Graf Cuntz von Glück by the Emperor Maximilian (who was Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, 1493-1519). Conrad was originally a working miner at Schneeberg where he was known as Armer Cuntz (poor Cuntz or Conrad) and grew wealthy from the mines of Fürst in Leberthal. This district is located in the Vosges Mountains on the borders of Lorraine and Upper Alsace. The story of Cuntz or Conrad von Glück is mentioned by Albinus (Meissnische Land und Berg Chronica, Dresden, 1589, p. 116), Mathesius (Sarepta, Nuremberg, 1578, fol. XVI.), and by others.
[31] Vladislaus III. was King of Poland, 1434-44, and also became King of Hungary in 1440. Tursius seems to be a Latinized name and cannot be identified.
BOOK II.
ualities which the perfect miner should possess and the arguments which are urged for and against the arts of mining and metallurgy, as well as the people occupied in the industry, I have sufficiently discussed in the first Book. Now I have determined to give more ample information concerning the miners.
In the first place, it is indispensable that they should worship God with reverence, and that they understand the matters of which I am going to speak, and that they take good care that each individual performs his duties efficiently and diligently. It is decreed by Divine Providence that those who know what they ought to do and then take care to do it properly, for the most part meet with good fortune in all they undertake; on the other hand, misfortune overtakes the indolent and those who are careless in their work. No person indeed can, without great and sustained effort and labour, store in his mind the knowledge of every portion of the metallic arts which are involved in operating mines. If a man has the means of paying the necessary expense, he hires as many men as he needs, and sends them to the various works. Thus formerly Sosias, the Thracian, sent into the silver mines a thousand slaves whom he had hired from the Athenian Nicias, the son of Niceratus[1]. But if a man cannot afford the expenditure he chooses of the various kinds of mining that work which he himself can most easily and efficiently do. Of these kinds, the two most important are the making prospect trenches and the washing of the sands of rivers, for out of these sands are often collected gold dust, or certain black stones from which tin is smelted, or even gems are sometimes found in them; the trenching occasionally lays bare at the grass-roots veins which are found rich in metals. If therefore by skill or by luck, such sands or veins shall fall into his hands, he will be able to establish his fortune without expenditure, and from poverty rise to wealth. If on the contrary, his hopes are not realized, then he can desist from washing or digging.