552 BOOK XII. 



that the water should be made more salty, and it is then run off through a 

 launder which leads into the caldron. From thirty-seven dippersful of brine 

 the master or his deputy, at Halle in Saxony,* makes two cone-shaped pieces 

 of salt. Each master has a helper, or in the place of a helper his wife assists 

 him in his work, and, in addition, a youth who throws wood or straw under 

 the caldron. He, on account of the great heat of the workshop, wears 

 a straw cap on his head and a breech cloth, being otherwise quite naked. 

 As soon as the master has poured the first dipperful of brine into the caldron 

 the youth sets fire to the wood and straw laid under it. If the firewood is 

 bundles of faggots or brushwood, the salt will be white, but if straw is burned, 

 then it is not infrequently blackish, for the sparks, which are drawn up with 

 the smoke into the hood, fall down again into the water and colour it black. 



In order to accelerate the condensation of the brine, when the master 

 has poured in two casks and as many dippersful of brine, he adds about a 

 Roman cyathus and a half of bullock's blood, or of calf's blood, or buck's 

 blood, or else he mi.xes it into the nineteenth dipperful of brine, in order that 

 it may be dissolved and distributed into all the corners of the caldron ; in other 

 places the blood is dissolved in beer. When the boiling water seems to be 

 mixed with scum, he skims it with a ladle ; this scum, if he be working with 

 rock-salt, he throws into the opening in the furnace through which the smoke 

 escapes, and it is dried into rock-salt ; if it be not from rock-salt, he pours 

 it on to the floor of the workshop. From the beginning to the boiling and 

 skimming is the work of half-an-hour ; after this it boils down for another 

 quarter-of-an-hour, after which time it begins to condense into salt. When 

 it begins to thicken with the heat, he and his helper stir it assiduously with a 

 wooden spatula, and then he allows it to boil for an hour. After this he pours 

 in a cyathus and a half of beer. In order that the wind should not blow 

 into the caldron, the helper covers the front with a board seven and a half 

 feet long and one foot high, and covers each of the sides with boards three and 

 three quarters feet long. In order that the front board may hold more 

 firmly, it is fitted into the caldron itself, and the sideboards are fixed on the 

 front board and upon the transverse beam. Afterward, when the boards 

 have been lifted off, the helper places two baskets, two feet high and as many 

 wide at the top, and a palm wide at the bottom, on the transverse beams, 

 and into them the master throws the salt with a shovel, taking half-an-hour 

 to fill them. Then, replacing the boards on the caldron, he allows the brine 

 to boil for three quarters of an hour. Afterward the salt has again to be 

 removed with a shovel, and when the baskets are full, they pile up the salt in 

 heaps. 



In different localities the salt is moulded into different shapes. In the 

 baskets the salt assumes the form of a cone ; it is not moulded in baskets 

 alone, but also in moulds into which they throw the salt, which are made in 



*The salt industry, founded upon salt springs, is still of importance to this city. It 

 was a salt centre of importance to the Germanic tribes before Charles, the son of Charlemagne, 

 erected a fortress here in 806. Mention of the salt works is made in the charter by Otto I., 

 conveying the place to the Diocese of Magdeburg, in 968. 



