102 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
smeltinys. When an ore is reduced to the metallic condition 
the operation is complete, and when conducted in a rude furnace 
contained doubtless a good deal of dirt and foreign matter. This 
impure ingot was weighed and stamped in the presence of the 
keepers and clerk on behalf of the king, and no one in or out 
of the Stannaries could have possession of any tin of the first 
smelting beyond a fortnight, unless this first stamping was com- 
plied with. 
The ingots of this first stamping could not be kept beyond 
thirteen weeks without being taken to the nearest Stannary town 
appointed for the purpose, and there melted and refined (not 
smelted), freed from impurities, and receiving the stamp which 
certified as to its purity and fitness for sale. 
The translation of this document in De la Beche constantly 
refers to the second smelting^ but this second process obviously 
means melting and refining ; for it is impossible to reconcile the 
very stringent rules and regulations of the first stamping, &c, 
with a crude mass of charcoal, unreduced black tin, and metal. 
It is stated that the refining of the tin shall be by weight of the 
city of Exeter ; that is, as eight is to nine. 
In other words, for every nine pounds of crude tin of the first 
stamping presented to the stannary refiner, eight pounds of pure 
tin, capable of taking the second stamp, must be returned to the 
owner. 
In the Museum of this Institution there is an ancient tin ingot, 
holed for pack-saddle purposes, fourteen inches long, eight inches 
at the widest end, and seven inches at narrowest, and weighing 
fifty-two pounds. It does not correspond with the weight or 
shape of the ingots referred to as being exported to Italy in the 
earlier portion of the fourteenth century, and is possibly an ingot 
of early type lost or stolen on its way to the coinage town. It 
was found, with another precisely similar to it, whilst digging a 
drain at Slade, near Cornwood. These ingots may have been 
stolen or lost whilst on their way to Plympton, which was made a 
stannary town as early as 1328. 
The laws guiding the tinners were comprehensive and, being 
framed by their own Parliament, were just and strictly administered 
in the interests of all concerned. The first Parliament of which 
we have any account met on Crockern Tor in 1491. The next 
of which we have details met in 1510. In Pearce's Laics and 
