do equal portions of both kinds of lead are mixed; in Pliny’s age, this mixture was called E

silver-tin; from this, in our times, plates and dishes are prepared.
Similarly, one must discuss other mixtures, both simple and composite, since they can be added to mixtures at any time.

ARTIFICIAL METALLIC SUBSTANCES.

What the dross of metals is.

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THERE are artificial metallic substances that are made in the first and second furnaces while metallic veins are smelted, while metal is separated from metal, or while liquefied bronze is tinted. These are Dross, Diphryges twice-roasted dross, Cadmia zinc oxide/calamine, Pompholyx zinc oxide, Spodos ashes/soot, Lithargyrium litharge, Molybdena lead/galena ore, and Scales. Some are made outside the furnaces, such as Verdigris, Azure, Ceruse, and the like, of which words will be spoken individually in their place. Primarily, in the smelting of metals, dross is generated, which is as it were the excrement of the smelted vein; artisans call this dross Loppas; it floats on the molten metal and, when cooled, is congealed and rendered soft like glass; and if they have retained any metallic moisture, they are heavy; when this is overcome, they become light. Thus, the more earthy and dreg-like part of the metal goes into the dross, which is the purgament of the vein cooked in furnaces, as has been said, speaking however of the vein of gold, silver, bronze, iron, and both kinds of lead; for veins of quicksilver and ash-lead do not produce dross since they are not smelted; we do not deny, however, that dross can come forth from ash-lead mixed with other metals and liquefied. Etymology of dross. This filth of metal is rightly called skoria Greek: dung/dross by the Greeks, since among them to skōr is dung; by Celsus, it is named the recrement of metal.

The filth or recrement of silver is had only when a vein of silver is purged in a furnace, but it cannot be sincere, because artisans, for the sake of purging silver, add some lead to it. What Helcyma is. This dross of silver is called Helcyma Greek: drawing/dross from helkō to draw, because this recrement is so viscous that it is drawn like glue. But the dross that is collected from bronze and iron is for the most part black, filthy, and spongy. G

The recrement of bronze:

A woodcut illustration of a porous, irregularly shaped mass of copper slag. The texture is cellular and honeycombed, with numerous cavities and jagged, rough edges, depicting a waste product of metal smelting. Shading and cross-hatching provide a three-dimensional effect of a dense, craggy substance.

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Of this condition and quality was that recrement of bronze, the image of which we provide in this place. This dross was offered to the Most Excellent man, Ulysses Aldrovandi, as a species of alcyonium sea foam/sponge, but he, having examined the matter carefully, recognized it to be a certain fistulous and light recrement that had been brought to the surface from bronze in the furnaces by the power of fire, and therefore he took care to have it delineated. Iron pours out a greater quantity of dross than bronze, since it is a more impure and more earthy metal; this is held not only when iron is melted in a furnace, but also when iron softens in the smith's workshop. But the dross of lead differs most from the others, because it is the least stony, nor is it brittle like the others, but is observed to be quite viscous on account of the softness of the metal.

What Diphryges is. Among these metallic drosses is counted Diphryges, and it is nothing else but another recrement of bronze, and it is called diphrygēs, as if twice-roasted, for phrygō is to roast among the Greeks.