Book X lapis sabinicus, lapis selentinus, lapis liparaeus and other mixtures of stone, metal and earth

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	214	DE NATURA FOSSILIUM

	Cadmia is black, yellow brown, or gray. Like the cadmia produced in furnaces this mineral occurs in various forms. Some has the appearance of grapes, some occurs in cubes while some forms in crusts. Natural cadmia is more potent than that formed in furnaces. Actually it is so corrosive that it will eat the moist hands and feet of a miner. It differs from pyrite both in color and other properties. Pyrite, unless it contains sulphates, is either a golden or silver color, rarely any other, while cadmia is black, yellow brown, or gray. The former will cure gatherings while the latter is a deadly poison and will destroy any living substance. It is used to kill grasshoppers, mice and flies.²⁶ This cadmia, like quicksilver, is placed in a flask and heated until the

	tities are found at Rauris. The latter mineral contains more silver than gold while the former contains only gold or very little silver mixed with the gold. Another species is also gray and is found in quite small grains at Reichenstein. It is mixed with the last species and gold is obtained from it. It is also found at Aldenberg, Silesia, where it has a somewhat different character and both gold and silver are obtained from it. Our miners also call this species kisum. (Note, kisum is probably arsenopyrite, a sulph-arsenide of iron.) Naevius. "When we come upon it will you show it to us? Bermannus. "Certainly. But returning to the pyrite with both a silver and golden color, it is often found in silver mines and more commonly in separate veins that are completely sterile, as I have already mentioned. Naevius. "What use does it have in metallurgy? Bermannus. "When it is found in large quantities it is melted into a kind of stone that is widely used in silver smelting. This pyrite is common in rivers and many chemists have collected it, only to be laughed at since it is almost sterile. Naevius. "Aside from these species Pliny mentions another saying people have another species of pyrite that is very heavy and has a large amount of fire." ²⁵ This may refer to the cobalt arsenides smaltite, cobaltite and their oxidation products. That it includes cobalt minerals is evident from the following excerpt from Bermannus, page 467, Bermannus. "This genus the miners call cobaltum, a name I believe we can now use, the Greeks call cadmia. The essences from which pyrite and silver are formed are seen to have congealed into a single body and thus has been created that which the miners call cobaltum (cobalt). There are those who believe it to be the same as pyrite since they have almost the same composition and there are others who regard it as a separate genus as do I. Very often it possesses an extraordinary corrosive quality so that it will eat into the hands and feet of workmen unless they take careful precautions against it. We know that pyrite will not do this. There are three species of this mineral which are more easily distinguished by color than by any other property. These are black, gray, and iron-colored. No matter what else they may contain there is usually more silver than in pyrite." It is possible that the black mineral is asbolan or heterogenite impure mixtures of cobalt and other metals that are found in Hesse, Thuringia, and other German localities. The gray and iron-colored minerals probably refer to several cobalt minerals but particularly to smaltite which has the same crystal form as pyrite and is associated with silver in some German mines. The derivation of cobalt through kobold, kobelt, etc., is interesting. The alchemists and miners of Saxony derived the name from the Greek root word καβάλος

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