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BOOK VIII
181
water pipes. It is used in making the rectangular tanks in which salt is obtained from salt solutions; soda from soda solutions; alum from alumi­nous solutions; and atramentum sutorium from solutions of air amentum. It is used in the lattices in which are set the glass disks to make window panes for transmitting light. Thin sheets are used to roof prominent buildings, churches and towers. Within the year thirty-five buildings in Magdeburg have had lead roofs put on them, the church of St. John being among them. The weight of a solid lead roof on this church would have been too great so alternate strips of lead and copper were used. The towers of the church in the convent of St. Mary were also roofed with lead. When the bottom of a goblet made from tin is coated with molten bismuth it will not change the color of wine.
Of these three metals lead alone is used in medicine. It cools and for that reason mortars and pestles are made from it and if liquids are rubbed in these so that there is a union with the lead solutions are produced that are more cooling. Sheets of lead are advantageously spread beneath the loins of athletes who, because of frequent exercises are harassed by dreams of beautiful women and discharge semen. Having been bound around the testes it drives away such dreams. Burnt lead has mixed properties and cures chronic ulcers. A cooling lotion is made from it. It is most useful in filling ulcers and preventing scars. It can be used to ad­vantage on both hard and cancerous ulcers, sometimes by itself, sometimes mixed with other drugs which prevent scars, for example, the drug made from cadmia.21 Galen is the authority for these statements.
There is a fourth genus in this group that is obtained from stibnite (stibi) when smelted.22 The stibnite is placed in large vessels over a fire and purified and reduced to a metal that has the appearance of bismuth. Dioscorides describes a method to be followed in burning it in order not to produce plumbum. This metal is added to bismuth and the letters with which they print books are cast from them after they are melted to­gether.23·24
and a sandy genus of rock. Each mineral can be readily distinguished by eye and sometimes they are seen to be well mixed. The black pebbles are separated from this mixture by drying, crushing, grinding, washing, and again drying. They then smelt the tin. Certainly this metal requires more preparation than any other. Xaevius. "After hearing all this the next time I return to my home I shall study their workings more carefully than I have up to now."
21  Probably zinc oxide.
22  It is obvious that Agricola had no knowledge of the Latin name for this metal, antimonium, that had been used by alchemists for many years.
23  Modern type metal is essentially an alloy of lead (80%) and antimony (20%). It is probable that Agricola knew this and bismuth is a text error for lead.
24  There is the following reference to stibnite in Bermannus, page 464,— Xaevius. "... Stibnite is not found in metallic mines?
Bermannus. "I do not know that it is found in these silver mines but it is found occasionally in the mines of Persibrana so mixed with silver that it can only be separated by smelting. It is often abundant in separate veins in various places, especially at Fichtelberg in the mountains that are the source of the Moenus, Sala, Egra, and Nabus rivers, and eleven miles from Plana, Bohemia."