6 ALLUSIONS TO BRONZE BY ANCIENT WRITERS. 



Hesiod, who is supposed to have lived about 900 B.C., and 

 who is the earliest European author whose works have come 

 down to us, distinctly states that iron was discovered after 

 copper and tin. Speaking of those who were ancient, even 

 in his day, he says that they used bronze, and not iron. 



^d\Kea /j,ev rev^ea. %a\Keoi, Se re olxoi 

 8' elpyd&vro ; //,eAa9 Vov^ ecr/ce (rlSrjpos. 



His poems, as well as those of Homer, show that nearly three 

 thousand years ago, the value of iron was known and appre- 

 ciated. It is true that, as we read in Dr. Smith's Dictionary 

 of Greek and Roman Antiquities, bronze " is represented in 

 the Iliad and Odyssey as the common material of arms, in- 

 struments, and vessels of various sorts; the latter (iron) is 

 mentioned much more rarely." While, however, the above 

 statement is strictly correct, we must remember that among 

 the Greeks the word iron (a&rjpos) was used, even in the 

 time of Homer, as synonymous with a sword, and that steel 

 also appears to have been known to them under the name of 

 aSa/xa9, and perhaps also of icvavos, as early as the time of 

 Hesiod. We may, therefore, consider that the Trojan war 

 took place during the period of transition from the Bronze to 

 the Iron age. 



Lucretius distinctly mentions the three ages. He says 



Anna antiqua, manus, ungues, dentesque fuerunt 

 Et lapides, et item sylvarum fragmina rami, 

 Posterius ferri vis est, serisque reperta, 

 Sed prior sens erat, quam ferri cognitus usus.* 



Coming down to more modern times, Eccardf in 1750, 

 and Goguet in 1758,J mention the three later ages in plain 

 terms, and the same idea runs through Borlase's History of 



* V. 1282. Arts et des Sciences. See Ch. iv. and 



t Eccard. De origine et moribus the preface. 



Germanorum. See Rhind in Arch. Ins. Jour. V. 



{ Goguet. De 1' origine des Lois, de xiii. 



