A HISTORY OF INVENTIONS AND DISCOVERIES. BY JOHN BECKMANN, PUBLIC PROFESSOR OF ECONOMY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, BY WILLIAM JOHNSTON. THIRD EDITION, CAREFULLY CORRECTED, AND ENLARGED BY THE ADDITION OF SEVERAL NEW ARTICLES. IN FOUR VOLUMES. VOL. IV. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN; HISTORY OF INVENTIONS. TIN. TINNING. It is generally believed that the metal called at present tin was known and employed in the arts, not only in the time of Pliny, bat so early as that of Herodotus, Homer, and Moses. This I will not venture to deny; but I can only admit that it is probable, or that the great antiquity of this metal cannot be so fully proved as that of gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, and quicksilver. Tin is one of those minerals which hitherto have been found only in a few countries, none of which ever belonged to the Greeks or the Romans, or were visited, at an early period, by their merchants. As it never occurs in a native state,* the * Native tin never, or, at any rate, very rarely occurs. In the year 1765 a piece was supposed to be found, of which an account may be VOL. IV. |