to the other. It is clear from the brief remark of Aristotle quoted in the preceding paragraph that Theophrastus was not the first to notice that anthrax could not be burnt. It is easy to understand why philosophers of the Peripatetic school would emphasize the paradox involved in a stone, which, though connected with fire by its name and appearance, was itself incombustible. As a matter of fact, garnet, though quite incombustible, is more readily changed by fire, owing to its lower melting point, than the different varieties of quartz from which most of the seals were made at the time of Theophrastus.
18. One might say that it has great value; for a very small one costs forty pieces of gold.
Probably the reference is to gold staters of Alexander III or his father Philip II of Macedon, which were in common use at the time; each of them weighed about 8.6 grams but had a much greater purchasing power than modern coins of the same preciousmetal content. King85 thought that in an age of extended commerce such a high price could scarcely have been paid for a stone as common as garnet, and it was largely because of this that he identified this first anthrax mentioned by Theophrastus as the ruby. However, "engraved garnets" first appeared in the Hellenistic period, as is shown by the surviving examples; possibly they were introduced during the lifetime of Theophrastus, and since they may have been a scarce and highly prized novelty at the time of their introduction, the price mentioned does not seem excessive. Furthermore, flawless garnets of brilliant red color are much scarcer than good specimens of the various kinds of quartz that the ancient Greeks valued highly as precious stones. It should not be forgotten that stones which were highly prized by the ancients, although apparently very costly at the time, would not usually be termed precious today; most of them would be rated as semiprecious, or even less valuable, stones.
18. Carthage and Massalia. Since Carthage in North Africa and Massalia at the site of modern Marseilles were both important seaports, it must be under-
85 C. W. King, Natural History of Precious Stones and of the Precious Metals (London, 1870), p. 225.
