END OF BOOK V.
FOOTNOTES:
[Pg 101][1] It has been suggested that we should adopt throughout this volume the mechanical and mining terms used in English mines at Agricola's time. We believe, however, that but a little inquiry would illustrate the undesirability of this course as a whole. Where there is choice in modern miner's nomenclature between an old and a modern term, we have leaned toward age, if it be a term generally understood. But except where the subject described has itself become obsolete, we have revived no obsolete terms. In substantiation of this view, we append a few examples of terms which served the English miner well for centuries, some of which are still extant in some local communities, yet we believe they would carry as little meaning to the average reader as would the reproduction of the Latin terms coined by Agricola.
| Rake | = A perpendicular vein. | |
| Woughs | = Walls of the vein. | |
| Shakes | = Cracks in the walls. | |
| Flookan | = Gouge. | |
| Bryle | = Outcrop. | |
| Hade | = Incline or underlay of the vein. | |
| Dawling | = Impoverishment of the vein. | |
| Rither | = A "horse" in a vein. | |
| Twitches | = "Pinching" of a vein. | |
| Slough | = Drainage tunnel. | |
| Sole | = Lowest drift. | |
| Stool | = Face of a drift or stope. | |
| Winds | } | = Winze. |
| Turn | ||
| Dippas | ||
| Grove | = Shaft. | |
| Dutins | = Set of timber. | |
| Stemple | = Post or stull. | |
| Laths | = Lagging. |
As examples of the author's coinage and adaptations of terms in this book we may cite:—
| Fossa latens | = Drift. |
| Fossa latens transversa | = Crosscut. |
| Tectum | = Hangingwall. |
| Fundamentum | = Footwall. |
| Tigna per intervalla posita | = Wall plate. |
| Arbores dissectae | = Lagging. |
| Formae | = Hitches. |
We have adopted the term "tunnel" for openings by way of outlet to the mine. The word in this narrow sense is as old as "adit," a term less expressive and not so generally used in the English-speaking mining world. We have for the same reason adopted the word "drift" instead of the term "level" so generally used in America, because that term always leads to confusion in discussion of mine surveys. We may mention, however, that the term "level" is a heritage from the Derbyshire mines, and is of an equally respectable age as "drift."
[2] See note on p. [46]-[47]. The canales, as here used, were the openings in the earth, in which minerals were deposited.
[Pg 102][3] This statement, as will appear by the description later on, refers to the depth of winzes or to the distance between drifts, that is "the lift." We have not, however, been justified in using the term "winze," because some of these were openings to the surface. As showing the considerable depth of shafts in Agricola's time, we may quote the following from Bermannus (p. 442): "The depths of our shafts forced us to invent hauling machines suitable for them. There are some of them larger and more ingenious than this one, for use in deep shafts, as, for instance, those in my native town of Geyer, but more especially at Schneeberg, where the shaft of the mine from which so much treasure was taken in our memory has reached the depth of about 200 fathoms (feet?), wherefore the necessity of this kind of machinery. Naevius: What an enormous depth! Have you reached the Inferno? Bermannus: Oh, at Kuttenberg there are shafts more than 500 fathoms (feet?) deep. Naevius: And not yet reached the Kingdom of Pluto?" It is impossible to accept these as fathoms, as this would in the last case represent 3,000 feet vertically. The expression used, however, for fathoms is passus, presumably the Roman measure equal to 58.1 inches.
[Pg 107][4] Cavernos. The Glossary gives drusen, our word drusy having had this origin.