16 THE INTELLECTUAL RISE IN ELECTRICITY. 



founded, it may be that the Phoenician voyages to the 

 Baltic were of still greater antiquity, for the beads of 

 Mycenae date from at least two thousand years before our 

 era. 



The amber was used by the ancient world as a jewel 

 and for decoration. Its color and lustre reminded the fan- 

 ciful Greeks of the virgin gold which glistened in the 

 sands of Pactolus, even as the brilliant metal had itself 

 recalled to them the yellow sunshine. Afterwards they 

 applied the same name to the compounds of metals which, 

 when burnished, gave a golden glow. They were all chil- 

 dren of the sun "Elector" reflecting in miniature his 

 radiance. Thus, in common with native gold and the 

 silver-gold alloys, the amber, in Hellenic speech, came to 

 be called "electron." 1 



Throughout Greek literature, even from the time of 

 Homer and Hesiod, the mention of it is frequent. It is 

 inlaid in the royal roof of Menelaus, it bejewels the brace- 

 lets of Penelope, the necklaces of Eumoeus, 2 and the shield 

 of Hercules. 3 Legends cluster thick about it. Through 

 the lost tragedy of ^schylus, the Hippolyta of Euripides 

 and the Metamorphoses of Ovid comes the myth of 

 Phaeton, recounting his death by the thunderbolt and fall 

 into the river Eridanus, and the , transformation of the 

 weeping Heliades into poplars ever sighing and shedding 

 their amber tears beside the stream. The Greek traders 

 coming to the mouth of the Po for their cargoes, easily 

 believed the story perhaps told to conceal the true 

 source that the resin had been gathered under the poplar 

 trees along the banks, or on the Electrides the islands at 

 the outlet of the river. Long afterwards, so firmly did the 



1 The ancient Greek poets called the sun rp^xrop and Homer repeatedly 

 so terms it (Iliad. Z/ 513: T/ 398). "Electron" is used very indefi- 

 nitely by the Greek classic writers and in fact has no permanent gender, 

 though commonly neuter. See Rossignol : Les Me"taux Dans 1'Anti- 

 quite", 345. Paris, 1863. 



1 Odyssey. Hesiod : Scutum Herculis. 



