Mirrors of copper, brass and gold, I have found mentioned only by the poets, who perhaps employed the names of these metals because they best suited their measure, or because they wished to use uncommon expressions, and thought a golden mirror the noblest. By the brass ones perhaps are to be understood only such as were made of mixed copper. Did golden mirrors occur oftener, I should be inclined to refer the epithet rather to the frame or ornaments than to the mirror itself; for at present we say a gold watch, though the cases only may be of that metal.
Mirrors seem for a long time to have been made of a mixture of copper and tin, as is expressly said by Pliny153, who adds, that the best were constructed at Brundisium. This mixture, which was known to Aristotle, produces a white metal, which, on account of its colour, may have been extremely proper for the purpose, and even at present the same mixture, according to the careful experiments made by Mr. Mudge, an Englishman154, produces the best metal for specula. It appears that the ancients had not determined the proportion very accurately; for Pliny assures us twice that in his time mirrors of silver were preferred. It is indeed not easy to ascertain the quantity of each metal that ought to be taken, and the most advantageous degree of heat; upon which a great deal depends. One of the principal difficulties is to cast the metal without blisters or air-holes, and without causing any part of the tin to oxidize, which occasions knots and cracks, and prevents it from receiving a fine polish. A passage of Lucian155, which no one as yet has been able to clear up, alludes certainly, in my opinion, to these faults. A mixture of copper and tin is so brittle, that it is very liable to crack; and a mirror formed of it, if not preserved with great care, soon becomes so dim, that it cannot be used till it has been previously cleaned and polished. For this reason a sponge with pounded pumice-stone was generally suspended, from the ancient mirrors, and they were kept likewise in a case or box, as may be seen by the greater part of those still extant. Mirrors of silver were less subject to this inconvenience, and I am inclined to think that the latter on this account made the former be disused, as we are informed by Pliny.
As ancient mirrors of metal are still to be found in collections of antiquities, it might be of some importance to the arts if chemical experiments were made on their composition. Those who have hitherto given us any account of them have contented themselves with describing their external figure and shape. Count Caylus156 is the only person, as far as I know, who caused any chemical experiments to be undertaken on this subject. They were made on a mirror found near Naples, by M. Roux, who asserts that the composition was a mixture of copper and regulus of antimony, with a little lead. Antimony however was not known to the ancients. If that metal was really a component part, the mirror must have been the work of more modern times, or it must be allowed that the artist had metal combined with antimony without knowing it; but the latter is not probable. The experiments made by Roux do not seem to me to have proved in a satisfactory manner the presence of regulus of antimony; moreover, no certain information can be derived from them, for the antiquity of the mirror was not ascertained; nor was it known whether it ought to be reckoned amongst the best or the worst of the period when it was made.
Those mirrors, which were so large that one could see one’s self in them at full length, must, in all probability, have consisted of polished plates of silver; for to cast plates of such a size of copper and tin would have required more art than we can allow to those periods; and I do not know whether our artists even now would succeed in them157.
We read in various authors, that, besides metals, the ancients formed stones into mirrors, which were likewise in use. It is undoubtedly certain that many stones, particularly of the vitreous kind, which are opake and of a dark colour, would answer exceedingly well for that purpose; but let the choice have been ever so good, they would not, in this respect, have been nearly equal to metals. These of all mineral bodies have the most perfect opacity; and for that reason the greatest lustre: both these properties are produced by their solidity; and hence they reflect more perfectly, and with more regularity, the rays of light that proceed from other bodies. Our glass mirrors, indeed, are properly metallic. Stones, on the other hand, have at any rate some, though often hardly perceptible, transparency; so that many of the rays of light are absorbed, or at least not reflected. Mention of stone mirrors occurs also so seldom in the ancients, that we may conclude they were made rather for ornament than real utility. In general, we find accounts only of polished plates or panels of stone, fixed in the walls of wainscoted apartments, which were celebrated on account of their property of reflection.
Pliny158 praises in this respect the obsidian stone, or, as it is now called, the Icelandic agate. Everything that he says of it will be perfectly intelligible to those who are acquainted with this species of stone or vitrified lava. The image reflected from a box made of it, which I have in my possession, is like a shadow or silhouette; but with this difference, that one sees not only the contour, but also the whole figure distinctly, though the colours are darkened. To form it into images and utensils, which Pliny speaks of, must have been exceedingly difficult, on account of its brittleness. I saw at Copenhagen, among other things made of it, a drinking-cup and cover, on which the artist had been employed four years.
Domitian, when he suspected that plots were formed against him, caused a gallery, in which he used to walk, to be lined with phengites, which by its reflection showed everything that was done behind his back159. Under that appellation we are undoubtedly to understand a calcareous or gypseous spar, or selenite, which is indeed capable of reflecting an image; but we cannot therefore pretend to say that the ancients formed mirrors of it; nor do I explain what Pliny says, where he speaks of the phengites, as if whole buildings had been once constructed of it160. That kind of stone, for various reasons, and particularly on account of its brittleness, is altogether unfit for such a purpose. At those periods, the windows of houses were open, and not filled up with any transparent substance, but only covered, sometimes by lattices or curtains. It is probable, therefore, that those openings of the walls of the building mentioned by Pliny, where the windows used to be, were filled up with phengites, which, by admitting a faint light, prevented the place from being dark even when the doors were shut; so that Pliny might say, “It appeared as if the light did not fall into the building, but as if it were inclosed in it.”
I might be accused of omission did I not here mention also a passage of Pliny161, where he seems to speak of a mirror made of an emerald, which Nero used to assist him to see the combats of the gladiators. Cary asserts that Nero was short-sighted, and that his emerald was formed like a concave lens. The former is expressly said by Pliny162, but the latter, though by Abat considered not improbable163, I can scarcely allow myself to believe, because such an interpretation of Pliny’s words is too forced, and because they can be explained much better in another manner. As no mention of such an excellent help to short-sighted people is to be found in any other ancient author, we must allow, if Cary’s opinion be adopted, that this property of the concave emerald was casually remarked, and that no experiments were made to cut any other natural or artificial glass in the same form for the like use, because people imagined that this property was peculiar to the emerald alone, which was then commonly supposed to be endowed with the power of greatly strengthening the eye-sight. Much more probable to me is the explanation of an Italian, which Abat also does not entirely reject, that the emerald had a smooth polished surface, and served Nero as a mirror164; and the passage of Pliny alluded to seems to have been thus understood by Isidore165 and Marbodæus. It may here be objected, that real emeralds are too small to admit of being used as mirrors; but the ancients speak of some sufficiently large for that purpose, and also of artificial ones