VOL. LXXXVI.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 57 



have had a much better foundation for reasoning than that of a mere hypothesis, 

 however ingenious and learned.* 



There is not the least reason to suppose that the ancients added iron or steel to 

 increase the hardness or strength of the allay of copper by tin ; nor does it appear 

 from the experiments with this mixture, exper. 17, and 18, that any advantage is 

 to be expected from this addition ; at least not for cutting instruments. I cannot 

 confirm the opinion above delivered, that the common metal of the ancients for 

 cutting instruments was the allay of copper with tin, by the experiments of other 

 persons, excepting those of Mr. Dize, in the Journal de Physique for 1790, p. 272. 

 He had only 25 grs. of an ancient dagger to operate on. This small quantity how- 

 ever afforded tin and copper, as appeared on dissolution in nitric acid. But Mr. 

 Dize made several analytical experiments on 8 different sorts of coins, Greek, Ro- 

 man, and Gallic. It appears from these experiments that these coins contained 

 from .fV of a grain to 24-i- grs. of tin in 100 grs. of each of the old metals. And 

 it appears that these coins contained no other metal but copper and tin. 



From the preceding experiments and observations we learn,that tin was infinitely 

 more valuable to the ancients than it is to the moderns : without this metal, it is 

 not easy to conceive how they could have carried on the practice, and invented the 

 greater part of the useful arts. Tin was even of more importance to the ancients, 

 than steel and iron are to the moderns; because allays of copper by tin would afford 

 better substitutes for steel and iron, than any substitutes which the ancients, in all 

 probability, could procure for allays of copper by tin. We see also the importance 

 of Britain, in times more remote probably than those of which we have any record 

 or tradition ; being probably the only country that furnished the metal so necessary 

 to the progress of civilization. If Mr. Locke had been acquainted with the pro- 

 perties of the allays of copper by tin, and of their extensive use in highly advanced 

 states of civilization among the ancients, he would have known that iron was not 

 the only metal, by the use of which we are in possession of the useful arts, nor con- 

 sequently is it " past doubt, that were the use of iron lost among us, we should in 

 a few ages be unavoidably reduced to the wants and ignorance of the ancient savage 

 Americans." In the barbarous state of its inhabitants, this island was known to 

 the civilized nations of Europe, Asia, and Africa ; and denominated in 2 of the 

 most ancient languages, namely, the Phoenician and Greek, by terms which de- 

 note, the land of tin ; for such, according to Bochart, is the import of Britain, a 

 corruption of Barat-Anac, or Bratanac ; and there is no doubt of the meaning of the 

 Greek word Cassiterides. 



I do not mean by these observation to represent, as authors in general have done, 

 that the ancients were not acquainted with the art of manufacturing iron, or steel, 

 till long after the common use of copper, or that they did not know the superior 

 properties of iron and steel : on the contrary, if this were the proper place, I could 

 show that iron, or at least steel, was manufactured, and its useful properties under- 

 * See Recueil d'Antiq. Egypt. Etrusques, Grequcs et Romanies, torn. 1. 4to, 176*1. 



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