The above were the several varieties of sand used by the ancients in dividing marble. More recently, a sand has been discovered that is equally approved of for this purpose; in a certain creek of the Adriatic Sea, which is left dry at low water only; a thing that renders it not very easy to be found. At the present day, however, the fraudulent tendencies of our workers in marble have emboldened them to use any kind of river-sand for the purpose; a mischief which very few employers rightly appreciate. For, the coarser the sand, the wider is the division made in the stone, the greater the quantity of material consumed, and the more extensive the labour required for polishing the rough surface that is left; a result of which is that the slabs lose so much more in thickness. For giving the last polish to marble,[2498] Thebaic stone[2499] is considered well adapted, as also porous stone, or pumice, powdered fine.
CHAP. 10. (7.)—STONE OF NAXOS. STONE OF ARMENIA.
For polishing marble statues, as also for cutting and giving a polish to precious stones, the preference was long given to the stone of Naxos,[2500] such being the name of a kind of touchstone[2501] that is found in the Isle of Cyprus. More recently, however, the stones imported from Armenia for this purpose have displaced those of Naxos.
CHAP. 11.—THE MARBLES OF ALEXANDRIA.
The marbles are too well known to make it necessary for me to enumerate their several colours and varieties; and, indeed, so numerous are they, that it would be no easy task to do so. For what place is there, in fact, that has not a marble of its own? In addition to which, in our description of the earth and its various peoples,[2502] we have already made it our care to mention the more celebrated kinds of marble. Still, however, they are not all of them produced from quarries, but in many instances lie scattered just beneath the surface of the earth; some of them the most precious even, the green Lacedæmonian marble, for example, more brilliant in colour than any other; the Augustan also; and, more recently, the Tiberian; which were first discovered, in the reigns respectively of Augustus and Tiberius, in Egypt. These two marbles differ from ophites[2503] in the circumstance that the latter is marked with streaks which resemble serpents[2504] in appearance, whence its name. There is also this difference between the two marbles themselves, in the arrangement of their spots: the Augustan marble has them undulated and curling to a point; whereas in the Tiberian the streaks are white,[2505] not involved, but lying wide asunder.
Of ophites, there are only some very small pillars known to have been made. There are two varieties of it, one white and soft, the other inclining to black, and hard. Both kinds, it is said, worn as an amulet, are a cure for head-ache, and for wounds inflicted by serpents.[2506] Some, too, recommend the white ophites as an amulet for phrenitis and lethargy. As a counter-poison to serpents, some persons speak more particularly in praise of the ophites that is known as “tephrias,”[2507] from its ashy colour. There is also a marble known as “memphites,” from the place[2508] where it is found, and of a nature somewhat analogous to the precious stones. For medicinal purposes, it is triturated and applied in the form of a liniment, with vinegar, to such parts of the body as require cauterizing or incision; the flesh becoming quite benumbed, and thereby rendered insensible to pain.
Porphyrites,[2509] which is another production of Egypt, is of a red colour: the kind that is mottled with white blotches is known as “leptospsephos.”[2510] The quarries there are able to furnish blocks[2511] of any dimensions, however large. Vitrasius Pollio, who was steward[2512] in Egypt for the Emperor Claudius, brought to Rome from Egypt some statues made of this stone; a novelty which was not very highly approved of, as no one has since followed his example. The Egyptians, too, have discovered in Æthiopia the stone known as “basanites;”[2513] which in colour and hardness resembles iron, whence the name[2514] that has been given to it. A larger block of it has never been known than the one forming the group which has been dedicated by the Emperor Vespasianus Augustus in the Temple of Peace. It represents the river Nilus with sixteen children sporting around it,[2515] symbolical of the sixteen cubits, the extreme height[2516] to which, in the most favourable seasons, that river should rise. It is stated, too, that in the Temple of Serapis at Thebes, there is a block not unlike it, which forms the statue of Memnon[2517] there; remarkable, it is said, for emitting a sound each morning when first touched by the rays of the rising sun.
CHAP. 12.—ONYX AND ALABASTRITES; SIX REMEDIES.
Our forefathers imagined that onyx[2518] was only to be found in the mountains of Arabia, and nowhere else; but Sudines[2519] was aware that it is also found in Carmania.[2520] Drinking-vessels were made of it at first, and then the feet of beds and chairs. Cornelius Nepos relates that great was the astonishment, when P. Lentulus Spinther exhibited amphoræ made of this material, as large as Chian wine-vessels in size; “and yet, five years after,” says he, “I saw columns of this material, no less than two-and-thirty feet in height.” At a more recent period again, some change took place[2521] with reference to this stone; for four[2522] small pillars of it were erected by Cornelius Balbus in his Theatre[2523] as something quite marvellous: and I myself have seen thirty columns, of larger size, in the banquetting-room which Callistus[2524] erected, the freedman of Claudius, so well known for the influence which he possessed.