MINING OPERATIONS OF THE ROMANS. 29 



fornis me, that those adits, which are reputed to be Roman, 

 are distinguished by being chiselled. 



The ancient gold mine of Gogofau, near Llan-Pumpsant, 

 in Carmarthenshire, was probably worked by the Romans, 

 who appear to have had a Station in the vicinity. " The 

 majority of the workings, extending to a considerable depth 

 for some acres over the side of the hill, are open to the 

 day, or worked, as usual in the early days of mining, like 

 a quarry. . . . Here and there a sort of cave has 

 been opened on some of the quartz veins, and in some 

 cases has been pushed on as a gallery, of the dimensions 

 of the larger levels of the present day, viz., 6 to 7 feet 

 high, and 5 or 6 feet wide. . . . If we examine Pliny 

 for the state of knovvledge on this subject among the 

 Romans, we find that gold was obtained by three pro- 

 cesses : first, washing the sands of certain rivers ; secondly, 

 following the lode by shafts and levels (puteis et cuniculis), 

 whilst the earth is supported where necessary by props or 

 pillars of wood ; thirdly, by excavating hollows of larger 

 magnitude, supported for a time by arches of rock, which 

 are afterwards gradually removed to allow the whole 

 superincumbent mass to break in. The ore is broken, 

 washed, burnt, ground to powder, and pounded with 

 pestles (quod effossum est, tunditur, lavatur, uritur, 

 molitur in farinam, et pilis cuditur)."* 



It only remains that I should give an account of the 

 production of iron in England under the Romans. This 

 appears to be the department in which the widest differ- 

 ence is perceptible betwecn ancient and modern Operations. 

 In the extraction of gold, silver, tin, lead, and copper, the 



* Warrington W. Smylli, m.a., on the Gogofau mine, in Memoirs of Ihe 

 Qeological Survty of Great Brilain, p. 481, 483. See also, Murohison's 

 Silurian 8y«U <«, P- 867 I und Archaoloyieal Jonini, tu., 173. 



