Homer tells us that the soldiers of the Greek and Trojan armies were provided with iron weapons, yet he reserves for the heroes weapons made of bronze. It seems that bronze being the most ancient, was therefore looked upon as the more noble metal; hence, its use is reserved for chiefs or great warriors. Among all nations, that which is the most ancient is ever the most honourable and the most sacred. Thus, to mention one instance only, the Jews of our own times still perform the ceremony of circumcision with a knife made of stone. In this case, the stone-knife is an object consecrated by religion, because the antiquity of this instrument is actually lost in the night of time. Bronze (or brass) is often mentioned in the Book of Genesis. Tubal-cain, the first metal-worker of the Scriptures, who forged iron for all kinds of purposes, also wrought in bronze (or brass). This alloy was devoted to the production of objects of ornament. We read in the First Book of Kings (vii. 13, 14), "And King Solomon sent and fetched Hiram out of Tyre. He was a widow's son of the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a worker in brass: and he was filled with wisdom, and understanding, and cunning to work all works in _brass_." The word _brass_ must be here understood as being synonymous with bronze, and certainly the Hebrew term had this signification. As a specially remarkable object of bronze work, we may mention the "sea of brass" of the Hebrews, which contained 3000 measures of water. Herodotus[30] speaks of another colossal basin made of bronze, which was sixty times the size of that which Pausanias, son of Cleobrontos, presented to the temple of Jupiter Orios, a temple which had been built near the Euxine, on the borders of Scythia. Its capacity was six hundred _amphoræ_, and it was six "fingers" in thickness. The Greeks used to employ these enormous basins in their religious ceremonies. In Sweden and Norway, large receptacles of a similar kind were in primitive ages employed in sacrificial ceremonies; they used to receive the blood which flowed from the slaughtered animals. In order to produce objects of this magnitude it was of course necessary to have at disposal large foundries of bronze. These foundries, which existed during historic periods, were preceded by others of less importance used during the pre-historic epochs which we are considering, that is, during the bronze epoch. Vestiges of these ancient foundries have been discovered in Switzerland, at Devaine, near Thonon, and at Walflinger, near Wintherthur; especially also at Echallens, where objects have been found which evidently originated from the working of some pre-historic foundry. At Morges, in Switzerland, a stone mould has been discovered, intended for casting hatchets. By running bronze into this ancient mould, a hatchet has been made exactly similar to some of those in our collections.