The Rev. S, Greatheed on Tin. 109 



two or three difFerent periods ; that is to say, they indicate as 

 many pauses in theii' deposition, which allowed perhaps of 

 some modification of temperature, and either a quicker or a 

 slower passage from a solvent state to that of a crystallized 

 deposition. 



XXV. On the Krwwledge and Commerce of Tin a)no7ig A?i- 

 cient Nations. By the Rev. Samuel Grkatheed*. 



OF the commerce by which Britain has been raised to its 

 present state of eminence, no article can vie for ancient 

 celebrity with that of Tin. Our country was known by the 

 name of Cassiterides, or the 7m Islands, by nations that were 

 actually ignorant of its situation. This, indeed, was carefully 

 secreted by its Phoenician visitors, at the same time that they 

 exaggerated its productions. Hence ancient writers, from 

 Herodotus to the elder Pliny, in reference to these subjects, 

 were involved in uncertaiiity and error ; and it has become 

 difficult, not only to reconcile their various statements, but 

 even to ascertain, in some instances, their meaning. Could 

 these objects, however, be attained, there still remain facts, for 

 which it is not more easy to account. Metallurgy, perhaps, above 

 every other useful art, has been remarkable, at all times, for 

 its mvsteries ; and to ancient naturalists, the mysteries of ti7i 

 seem to have been inscrutable. 



No metal of equal utility is no'w, T apprehend, to be found 

 in so few countries ; and most of these were theii unknown to 

 the more civilized nations, and the rest were at remote di- 

 stances from them. Yet tin is named among other metals, by 

 Moses, sixteen centuries before the Christian era ; and Homer, 

 who wrote eight centuries later, represents it to have been 

 used at the siege of Troy, apparently in the eleventh century 

 before Christ. The first population of Britain will not rea- 

 sonably admit of being assigned to an earlier date ; and tlie 

 Phoenicians seem to have first extended their navigation to 

 the Atlantic Ocean about the same time. Another century, 

 or more, may naturally be allowed for them to penetrate so 

 far northward as Britain, and to obtain from its south-western 

 extremity, and the adjacent islands, this celebrated article of 

 their commerce. So incommunicative, however, were they, 

 concerning the original deposit of the treasure, that Herodotus 

 (inquisitive and indefatigable as he demonstrates himself to 

 have been) could only learn, 400 years after Homer, that tin 



* From the Transaction* of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, 

 vol.ii. ]82iJ. 



was 



