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On Wed, 17 Feb 1999 22:45:18 GMT Peter Claughton <[log in to unmask]> wrote: Given the principal use for lead, in construction work, it is > unlikely that it was mined for its own sake before the use of stone in the > large buildings became commonplace - lead was initially available as a > bi-product of silver refining. Peter, I'm not sure that I would agree with this statement. I've heard it said about the Roman period, too (although where I heard that escapes me for the moment). The Romans were using a lot of lead for plumbing and the like (lining baths etc.) as well as other, more bizarre pruposes (like medicines, cosmetics and weights), and were taking it out of most lead producing areas of England (not all of which were silver producing). The sheer scale of the Roman lead industry was incredible: Hong et al (Science, vol 265, 1994,pp1841-1843) estimated that the Roman lead industry was producing as much lead as the Industrial Revolution lead industry (I forget the exact amounts. They estimated from the amount of lead contamination in Greenland ice cores. It could be that Roman lead smelters were very inefficient, but even with a 50% loss as fumes, there was a lot of lead production). I don't accept that it was all as a by product. Similarly in the Medieval period, certainly there is a big decrease in the demand for lead, and a big decrease in the amount of lead smelted, but there wasn't a decrease in the demand for silver... Ken ---------------------- Ken Hamilton c/o Department of Archaeological Sciences University of Bradford Richmond Road Bradford BD7 1DP West Yorkshire UK (01274) 235906 http://www.student.brad.ac.uk/kchamil1/ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%