BOOK VI. 



151 



The iron block is six digits in length and width ; at the upper end it is 

 two digits thick, and at the bottom a digit and a half. The iron plate is 

 the same length and width as the iron block, but it is very thin. All of these, 

 as I explained in the last book, are used when the hardest kind of veins are 

 hown <nit. Wedges, locks, and plates, are likewise made larger or smaller. 



A — Smallest OF THE SM.\LLER HAMMERS. B — Intermediate. C — Largest. D — Small 



KIND OF THE LARGER HAMMER. E — LaRGE KIND. F — WoODEN HANDLE. G — HANDLE 

 FIXED IN THE SMALLEST HAMMER. 



Hammers are of two kinds, the smaller ones the miners hold in 

 one hand, and the larger ones they hold with both hands. The former, 

 because of their size and use, are of three sorts. With the smallest, 

 that is to say, the lightest, they strike the second " iron tool ; " with the 

 intermediate one the first " iron tool ; " and with the largest the third " iron 

 tool " ; this one is two digits wide and thick. Of the larger sort of hammers 

 there are two kinds ; with the smaller they strike the fourth " iron tool ; " 

 with the larger they drive the wedges into the cracks ; the former are three, 

 and the latter five digits wide and thick, and a foot long. All swell out in 

 their middle, in which there is an eye for a handle, but in most cases the 

 handles are somewhat light, in order that the workmen may be able to strike 

 more powerful blows by the hammer's full weight being thus concentrated. 



•(Continued) — The Latin and old German terms for these tools were : — 



The German words obviously had local value and do not bear translation literally. 



