160 BOOK VI. 



ground, which miners place under the hoppers which are close by the shaft 

 houses, these are usually hollowed out of single trees. Hoppers are generally 

 made of four planks, so cut on the lower side and joined together that the 

 top part of the hopper is broader and the bottom part narrower. 



I have sufficiently indicated the nature of the miners' iron tools and 

 their vessels. I will now explain their machines, which are of three kinds, 

 that is, hauling machines, ventilating machines, and ladders. By means of 

 the hauling machines loads are drawn out of the shafts ; the ventilating 

 machines receive the air through their mouths and blow it into shafts or 

 tunnels, for if this is not done, diggers cannot carry on their labour without 

 great difficulty in breathing ; by the steps of the ladders the miners go 

 down into the shafts and come up again. 



Hauling machines are of varied and diverse forms, some of them being 

 made with great skill, and if I am not mistaken, they were unknown to the 

 Ancients. They have been invented in order that water may be drawn from 

 the depths of the earth to which no tunnels reach, and also the excavated 

 material from shafts which are likewise not connected with a tunnel, or if 

 so, only with very long ones. Since shafts are not all of the same depth, there 

 is a great variety among these hauling machines. Of those by which dry loads 

 are drawn out of the shafts, five sorts are in the most common use, of which 

 I will now describe the first. Two timbers a little longer than the shaft are 

 placed beside it, the one in the front of the shaft, the other at the back. 

 Their extreme ends have holes through which stakes, pointed at the bottom 

 like wedges, are driven deeply into the ground, so that the timbers may remain 

 stationary. Into these timbers are mortised the ends of two cross-timbers, 

 one laid on the right end of the shaft, while the other is far enough 

 from the left end that between it and that end there remains suitable 

 space for placing the ladders. In the middle of the cross-timbers, posts are 

 fixed and secured with iron keys. In hollows at the top of these posts 

 thick iron sockets hold the ends of the barrel, of which each end projects 

 beyond the hollow of the post, and is mortised into the end of another 

 piece of wood a foot and a half long, a palm wide and three digits thick ; 

 the other end of these pieces of wood is seven digits wide, and into each 

 of them is fixed a round handle, likewise a foot and a half long. A 

 winding-rope is wound around the barrel and fastened to it at the 

 middle part. The loop at each end of the rope has an iron hook which 

 is engaged in the bale of a bucket, and so when the windlass revolves by 

 being turned by the cranks, a loaded bucket is always being drawn out of the 

 shaft and an empty one is being sent down into it. Two robust men turn 

 the windlass, each having a wheelbarrow near him, into which he unloads 

 the bucket which is drawn up nearest to him ; two buckets generally fill a 

 wheelbarrow ; therefore when four buckets have been drawn up, each man 

 runs his own wheelbarrow out of the shed and empties it. Thus it happens 

 that if shafts are dug deep, a hillock rises around the shed of the windlass. 

 If a vein is not metal-bearing, they pour out the earth and rock without 

 discriminating ; whereas if it is metal-bearing, they preserve these materials, 



