|
GAGATES.
|
131
|
||
|
|
|||
|
are
set forth by Orpheus (468), who indeed appears to have been Pliny's
authority on this article. Marbodus notices the electricity it acquires
by friction, and the fact that the British kind was of equally good
quality with the Lycian. This electricity procured for it in the Middle
Ages the title of Black Amber ; in fact, it often occurs in the same
beds of Lignite as the real Amber, and is probably due to the
fossilised branches of the same tree that produced the resin, the
origin of the latter. This origin is declared by the regular woody
structure Jet presents when cut in very thin slices and viewed by
transmitted light : it then becomes translucent, and changes to a
reddish-brown. When the Roman traders brought back the tale of the
natives on the Baltic coast employing Amber for fuel, ignorant of its
value, it is allowable for us to modify the statement, and interpret
their report as relating to the use of coarse Jet, or Kimmeridge Coal a
cognate substance, for such a purpose. The earliest Celtic remains
would serve to show that Amber was from the first too much valued as an
ornament ever to have been thus wasted.
Jet
was, however, turned by the lathe into ornaments by the Britons,
perhaps even before the Romans subjugated this island, since large
rings worked out of solid pieces, for bracelets and anklets, are often-
discovered amongst other British remains. The round disks, cut out from
the centre of these rings, the refuse of the turner, often found in
heaps together in Dorsetshire, long puzzled antiquaries, who agreed to
call them " Kimmeridge Coal-money," and to regard them as a primitive
currency ! Their true origin has been but lately ascertained.*
The Boman settlers in Germany and Gaul learnt from
*
It will be observed that Pliny was unacquainted with the use of Jet as
an ornament, merely specifying its value in medicine and in the arts.
Ê 2
|
|||
|
|
|||