83 



Upon the whole, the case is probably thus. It is the old 

 rhojnician trade, destroyed with Carthage, which Strabo 

 describes, and Pub. Crassus went to explore in the xao-o-irepSe?. 

 Diodorus Siculus narrates the course of trade in the days of 

 Augustus from Ictis, when Gaul offered an easy route to the 

 Mediterranean; but 100 years of war and commotion inter- 

 rupted this trade of Cornwall with the East, and Pliny was 

 suspicious of the fables of Greece, and knew that tin was 

 obtained in Spain. Notwithstanding this fact, it appears that 

 Cornwall and the Asiatic Isles have been the principal, almost 

 the only sources of the Tin of the antient world, that of 

 Zinnwald being quite unknown till a much later date. 



Stannum is evidently an alloy of an argentine or tin-like 

 aspect — a variable pewter — a metal more easily melted than 

 copper, for the lining of which it was much used in Pliny's days 

 to obviate the danger of cupreous solutions. This process we 

 now call Tinning, and Stannum* with its variable meanings 

 is perhaps the common parent of the French Etain, meaning as 

 often Pewter as Tin, and of the German Zinn, which like ' Tin' 

 in the English workshops, is used sometimes for Pewter when 

 lining vessels, and solder when covering surfaces which are to 

 be joined. Our German Silver, Britannia Metal, «&c., belong 

 to this class. The process of illination with Stannum must 

 have been well executed to justify the exclamation of Pliny, that 

 it did not augment the weight of the vessel to which it was ap- 

 plied. The Brundisian Specula made of it yielded to Silver, 

 indeed, at last ; but they are declared to have been of admira- 

 ble efficiency. 



Stannum then is an alloy of Tin with Lead, Tin with Brass, 

 Tin with Antimony, Lead with Silver, or other variable mixtures 

 of metals often associated in nature. 



Pliny mentions adulterate or alloyed kinds of Stannum, com- 

 posed of 1 part white brass to 3 parts of candidum plumbum ; 



• Pliny's notices of Stannum are frequent. See Hardouin, Vol. ii. 429, 22; 528, 

 7 ; 630, 30, 31, &c. 



Stanno et sere mixtis 627, 11 — illitum seneis vasis saporem gratiorem facit, 669, 

 14— discern! vix possit ab argento 669, 26 — eeramentis jungitur, 669, 11. 



