[ 185 ]
will not cut thoſe Gems which are work'd into Seals; tho' the Stone with which they are worked is compoſed of the ſame Kind of Matter with the Whetſtone, or ſomething not very unlike it. Theſe Stones are from Armenia[1].
LXXVIII. The Nature of the Stone
- ↑
The Armenian Whetſtones, Coticulæ of the Latins, and Ἀκόναι of the Greeks, were of a Stone of extreme Hardneſs; and, as we may learn from this Paſſage, of the ſame Nature with that, which they uſed for the working ſome of thoſe Stones which Iron could not touch.
This Stone uſed for working on others they firſt had from Cyprus; and ſome of the antient Greeks called it Adamas, from its extreme Hardneſs; as they alſo did ſometimes Iron, for the ſame Reaſon. This Manner of Writing has much miſled their Copiers; and even Pliny, who, after having in one Place given the right Account of this Stone, and called it Cos, in another miſtakes it for a Diamond, and calls it ſuch. This was the Effect of his copying from various Authors in different Parts of his Work; and not ſeeing, in many Places, that they were deſcribing only the ſame Subſtance under two different Names. This Cyprian Stone was long in Eſteem, and ſerved not only for poliſhing, but boring Holes through ſuch Gems as they ſtrung on Threads, to wear for Bracelets, and other the like Ornaments. But After-ages found out the Armenian, which proving much harder than it, became more generally uſed, and at length entirely baniſhed the other. That this Armenian was of the ſame Kind with their Ἀκόναι, is evident from this Paſſage of Theophraſtus; and that it had the Properties of the Cyprian, and was uſed as it, is plain from Stephanus's Account of it, παρέχονται δὲ λίθον τὴν γλύφȣσαν καὶ τρυπῶσαν τὰς σφραγῖδας. Pliny's Account of other Gems being bored by Cyprian Diamonds, means no more, than that they were wrought by a Stone of the Nature of the Ἀκόνη, brought from Cyprus.
that the Obſidianus could not cut the true Gems, Obſidianæ fragmenta veras gemmas non ſcarifant.
