[82] [It has been observed by an anonymous reviewer (British and Foreign Medical Review, vol. viii. p. 361) that a passage in Strabo authorises the belief that the ancients were acquainted with this metal in its separate state, and that it is the _false silver_, ψευδάργυρον, of that ancient geographer.] [83] Bulletin des fouilles d’une ville Romaine, p. 11. [84] Plin. lib. xxxiv. sect. 22. [85] Zinc-ore, besides being mentioned by Aristotle and Strabo, is mentioned by Galen, De Simplic. Medicam. Facultatibus, lib. ix. p. 142. As he found no furnace-calamine when he resided in Cyprus, he procured from the overseer of the mines some raw _cadmia_, which had been found in the mountains and rivulets, and which certainly must have been calamine. [86] At first it was called _æs cyprium_, but in the course of time only _cyprium_; from which was at length formed _cuprum_. It cannot however be ascertained at what periods these appellations were common. The epithet _cupreus_ occurs in manuscripts of Pliny and Palladius; but one cannot say whether later transcribers may not have changed _cyprius_ into _cupreus_, with which they were perhaps better acquainted. The oldest writer who uses the word _cuprum_ is Spartian; who says, in the Life of Caracalla, “cancelli ex ære vel cupro.” But may not the last word have been added to the text as a gloss? Pliny, book xxxvi. 26, says, “Addito cyprio et nitro;” which Isidore, xvi. 15, p. 393, expresses by the words _adjecto cupro et nitro_. The superiority of the Cyprian copper gave occasion to this appellation; as the best iron or steel was called _chalybs_, from the _Chalybes_ (a people of Galatia) who prepared the finest, and carried on the greatest trade with it. But in what did the superiority of this Cyprian copper consist? In its purity, or in its colour, which approached near to that of gold? That island produced a great deal of ore which contained zinc, and abounded also with calamine. Pliny says, “in Cypro prima fuit æris inventio.” Red copper however had been known there from the earliest periods, so that the honour of its invention must be allowed to that island without any contradiction; and Pliny must undoubtedly allude in the above passage to some particular kind.