1898.] on the Metals used by the Great Nations of Ant I quit i/. 617 



top of the mound there is little else than that metal. The Palestine 

 Exploration Fund has kindly lent me specimens of these finds for 

 exhibition. About b.c. 700, Lachish was the headquarters of Sen- 

 nacherib during his invasion of Palestine. From it he sent his 

 messengers to Hezekiah, and at the same town he received the peace 

 offering of the Jewish king, 300 talents of silver and 30 talents of 

 gold, to raise which he had to despoil his palace and the Temple. 

 In Sennacherib's own version of the transaction the silver is given 

 as 800 talents, and the gold 30. Lachish was finally deserted about 

 400 B.C. - 



Greece. 



Wo know little of the very early history of Greece, for the most 

 ancient monuments bear no inscriptions, and literature did not com- 

 mence till the time of the Homeric poems. In these, and in Hesiod, 

 there are many graphic descriptions of the habits and arts of the 

 heroic period, including the use of metals ; and many of the towns 

 described in them have recently been explored with great success, 

 and have y'elded up the very materials about which they sang. 



Piobably the earliest find has been in the volcanic island of 

 Santorin, where, uud. r beds of pozzolana. which are supposed to date 

 about 2000 b.c , have been found two little rings of beaten gold and 

 a saw of pure copper. In the Ashmolean Museum there are a very 

 ancient silver ball and beads of the same metal rolled from the flat, 

 also a spear-head of copper. These were obtained from Amorgos. 

 In Antiparos there have also been found very ancient objects of silver 

 mixed with copper. 



Passing to the mainland, the towns of the Peloponnesus and the 

 momid of Hissarlik, the supposed Troy, have been explored by, 

 Dr. Si hliemann, Dr. Tsountas, and Dr. Dorpfeld ; and they reveal 

 what is termed the MycenEean period, which figures so largely in the 

 poems of Homer and Hesiod. In these the precious metals, gold and 

 silver, are constantly mentioned, together with xakKo<i. generally 

 translated br.iss. Thus, in the description of Achilles' shield, we are 

 introduced to Hephaistos at his great forge on Etna, heating the bars 

 of silver, or brass, or tin, or gold, and then hammering them on the 

 anvil, so forming the designs which represent so beautifully tlie 

 various scenes of j eace and war. After having fashioned the shiekl, 

 he is represented as forging for the warrior a cuirass of copper, 

 greaves of tin, and a helmet with a golden crest. 



Homer frequently mentions iron, but generally gives it the epithet 

 *' worked with toil," and treats it as a rare and costly metal. Thus 

 a huge iron discus was given as a valuable prize to the hero who 

 could throw it the farthest in the athletic games at the funeral of 

 Patroclus. 



Mr. W. E. Gladstone, who has long turned the great powers of 

 his mind from time to time to Homeric studies, wrote me lust summer : 

 " The poems of Homer showed mc, I think, forty years ago that tijcy 



