monly used for seals. Though some have maintained that diamond in the form of splinters or powder was used by the ancients for engraving stones, there is no real evidence to support this. It is very doubtful whether diamonds were even known to the peoples of the Mediterranean region in ancient times.298 On the other hand, there is definite evidence, both literary and geological, that corundum in the form of emery was available to them and was employed for engraving gems. Dioscorides299 mentions a stone named σμνρις as the kind used by jewelers for polishing their precious stones, and Hesychius300 defines this as a kind of sand used for the same purpose. It is from this Greek word that our English word, emery, is derived. Pliny, however, appears to use adamas as one name for the kind of stone that was employed for engraving gems, for he states301 that fragments of this were imbedded in iron by engravers and used for cutting the hardest substances; and in another place,802 where he seems to be following in part the statements of Theophrastus in this section, he remarks that all precious stones may be cut and polished by the aid of adamas. Though his descriptions of adamas303 show that the name was a generic one used for various minerals of pronounced hardness, it seems clear that corundum, either in the form of the wellcrystallized mineral or in the impure form of emery, was usually meant. The adamas mentioned by Theophrastus in section 19 was probably this same mineral. Possibly Theophrastus does not give a definite name to the stone used for engraving seals because the corundum or emery that was used for this purpose went by so many different names. In another place, Pliny states304 that the stone of Naxos had long been used for cutting and polishing precious stones, and though there is some confusion about the origin of its name, it is highly probable that it was described in this way because it first came from the island of Naxos in the Aegean Sea.805 This makes its identification almost certain, because the chief mineral product of Naxos has long been a high grade of emery widely used as an abrasive. Later in the same pas-
288 Partington, Origins and Development of Applied Chemistry, pp. 291, 507.
289 V, 165 (Wcllmann ed., V, 147). 300 S.v. σμφίι. ο" XXXVII, 6o.
3<>2 χχχνίΐ, 20ο. 8°8XXXVII, 55-61.
^χχχγι, 54.
805 Bliimner, Technologie umd Terminologie der Gewerbe und Kiinste bet Griechen und Romern, Vol. Ill, pp. 198-99.
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