Cinnabar means to gild silver and gold to objects) "the toxic properties of mercury were well known. It was dangerous to those who mined and processed cinnabar, it caused shaking, loss of sense, and death. Data suggest that mercury was retorted from cinnabar and the workers were exposed to the toxic mercury fumes." Overexposure to mercury, mercurialism, was seen as an occupational disease to the ancient Romans: "Mining in the Spanish cinnabar mines of Almadén, southwest of Madrid, was regarded as being akin to a death sentence due to the shortened life expectancy of the miners, who were slaves or convicts."
Sulphur Bank Mine tin ore. Oxland believed the cinnabar ore at Sulphur Bank had been formed from hot springs. His thesis stated that hot springs brought metals in a dissolved state from igneous rock deep in the earth through a thick block of metamorphised ancient seabed to form cinnabar ore near the surface of the mine. Oxland also believed the cinnabar deposit was continually forming. Becker came to agree with the Oxland thesis. There were a number of mysteries about the Sulphur Bank that Becker attempted to solve. Among them was how sulfur had been delivered to the surface of the mine and