Giannis vs Polinik on the color of bronze :)

[Paullus Scipio]

Gaius Julius Caesar wrote:
I had always understood the import of tin from Britain to produce bronze included the bronze used/made in Greece?
Is this also incorrect?

Tin was obviously of extreme importance for bronze making throughout ancient times, and it was imported long distances from known tin mining districts of antiquity, namely Erzgebirge along the border between Germany and Czech Republic, the Iberian Peninsula - the fabled Tartessus,( from before Assyrian times onward) Brittany in France (exploited mainly after the Roman conquest of Gaul), and Devon and Cornwall in southwestern England. Another minor source of tin is known to exist at Monte Valerio in Tuscany, Italy. This source was exploited by Etruscan miners around 800 BC, but it was not a significant source of tin for the rest of the Mediterranean. The Etruscans themselves found the need to import tin from the northwest of the Iberian Peninsula at that time, and later from Cornwall......Devon and Cornwall were important sources of tin for Europe and the Mediterranean throughout ancient times, but began dominating the market during late Roman times in the 3rd century AD with the exhaustion of many Spanish tin mines.......

Mining in Cornwall has existed from the early Bronze Age around 2150 BC. Cornwall was traditionally thought to have been visited by metal traders from the eastern Mediterranean.The Rillaton Cup and the Pelynt Dagger are two artifacts that have been found in Cornwall that show contact with the Mycenaean Greek world. However, later, it is likely that the tin trade with the Mediterranean was controlled by the Veneti across the channel, who traded it it on down through Southern France and the Mediterranean. Britain was one of the places proposed for the 'Cassiterides', that is Tin Islands.

As South-West Britain was one of the few parts of England to escape glaciation in the Ice Ages, tin ore was readily available on the surface. Originally it is likely that alluvial deposits in the gravels of streams were exploited but later underground working took place. Shallow cuttings were then used to extract ore.

Control of the tin trade to Eastern Mediterranean and Middle Eastern countries seems to have been in Phoenician hands and they kept their sources secret - but significantly by their control of the Pillars of Melquart/Herakles ( straits of Gibraltar) and colony at Gades/Cadiz, they controlled both Spanish/Tartessian and British sources. The Greeks understood that tin came from the 'Cassiterides', the "tin islands", of which the geographical identity is debated, but most likely refers to Devon and Cornwall. By 500 BC Hecataeus knew of islands beyond Gaul where tin was obtained. Pytheas of Massalia(Marseilles) travelled to Britain about 325 BC where he found a flourishing tin trade, according to the late report of his voyage. Posidonius referred to the tin trade with Britain around 90 BC but Strabo in about 18 AD did not list tin as one of Britain's main exports. This is likely to be because Rome was obtaining most of its tin from Spain at the time.