Natural History (Pliny) developed for counterfeit coins and proved very popular with the victims, mostly ordinary people. He deals with the liquid metal mercury, also found in silver mines. He records that it is toxic, and amalgamates with gold, so is used for refining and extracting that metal. He says mercury is used for gilding copper, while antimony is found in silver mines and is used as an eyebrow cosmetic. The main ore of mercury is cinnabar, long used as a pigment by painters. He says that the colour is similar to "scolecium", probably the kermes insect. The dust is very toxic, so
Type metal details because molten lead shrinks and sags when it cools to a solid. After much experimentation it was found that adding pewterer's tin, obtained from cassiterite, improved the ability of the cast type to withstand the wear and tear of the printing process, making it tougher but not more brittle. Despite patiently trying different proportions of both metals, solving the second part of the type metal problem proved very difficult without the addition of yet a third metal, antimony. Alchemists had shown that when stibnite, an antimony sulfide ore, was heated with scrap iron, metallic antimony was produced. The typefounder