Musaeum metallicum

A woodcut illustration of a mineral formation labeled with the numeral '1' above it. To its left, the text identifies it as "Cadmia Botrytis altera maior." The illustration shows a large, irregularly shaped mass with a dense, bumpy, or grape-like surface texture.

A second woodcut illustration of a mineral formation labeled with the numeral '2' above it. To its left, the text identifies it as "Cadmiæ Botrytis figura minor." The illustration shows a smaller, more compact, and somewhat flatter piece of mineral with a similar grape-like texture.

G

Etymology
of Pom-
pholyx.

Etymology

of Spodi-
um.

H

Spodium
is an
equivocal
term
among
the Arabs.

Cadmia zinc ore, Pompholyx zinc oxide, and Spodium impure zinc oxide differ based on the fineness of their substance. As has been explained, Cadmia condenses into a solid material, but Pompholyx and Spodium adhere to the walls of furnaces like dust, since they originate from the same material in those furnaces where bronze is perfected or where Cadmia is cremated. Pompholyx is lighter because, as it flies toward the furnace arches, it agglutinates like bubbles, from which it draws its name, since pompholyx is "bubble" in Greek. Spodium is heavier in comparison to Cadmia; for this reason, it falls onto the ground like ash, from which it received its name; for spodios is called "ash-like," since spodos is named "ash" among the Greeks. Indeed, antispodium a substitute for spodium is prepared by art from the cremated leaves of myrtle or wild olive, which takes the place of the ash, or spodium. Avicenna writes a confused history of this metallic substance when he asserts that Tutia tutty is the smoke that is sublimated, but Succudum the residue is what remains at the bottom; perhaps by Tutia he understood Pompholyx, and by Succudum he understood Spodium, which tends downward by reason of its weight. But among the Arabs, this name (spodium) labors under ambiguity because this word indicates not only Succudum, but also a non-metallic substance prepared from the burnt roots of reeds. Thus, metallic spodium is a certain purgament collected by bronze-smiths from the floor, sometimes mixed with hair and sometimes agglutinated with chaff. Today it is brought from Germany under the name of German Tutia, although there it is called Nil. Dioscorides commends Cyprian spodium for medical use as being less dreggy, which we show elegantly delineated under number 3.