From a comparison of the different amounts of gold and silver collected by David, it appears that the pro- portion of the former to the latter was 1 to 9 nearly. Three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold were demanded of Hezekiah by Sennacherib (2 Kings xviii, 14 ) : but later, when Pharaoh-nechoh took Jeho- ahaz prisoner, he imposed upon the land a tribute of 100 talents of silver, and only one talent of gold (2 Kings xxili, 33). The difference in the proportion of gold to silver in these two cases is very remarkable, and does not appear to have been explained. See Monev.
Brass, or more properly copper, was a native product of Palestine, " a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig copper'' (Deut. viii, 9 ; Job xxviii, 2). It was so plentiful in the days of Solomon that the quantity employed in the Temple could not be estimated, it was so great (1 Kings vii, 47). Much of the copper which David had prepared for this work was taken from the Syrians after the defeat of Hadadezer (2 Sam. viii, 8), and more was presented by Toi, king of Hamath. The market of Tyre was supplied with ves- sels of the same metal by the merchants of Javan, Tubal, and Meshech (Ezek. xxvii, 13). There is strong reason to believe that brass, a mixture of copper and zinc, was unknown to the ancients. To the latter metal no allu- sion is found. But tin was well known, and from the dif- ficulty which attends the toughening of pure copper so as to render it fit for hammering, it is probable that the mode of deoxidizing copper by the admixture of small quantities of tin had been early discovered. "We are inclined to think," says Mr. Napier, " that Moses used no copper vessels for domestic purposes, but bronze, the use of which is less objectionable. Bronze, not being so subject to tarnish, takes on a finer polish, and being much more easily melted and cast, it probably was more extensively used than copper alone. These prac- tical considerations, and the fact that almost all the antique castings and other articles in metal which are preserved from these ancient times are composed of bronze, prove in our ojiinion that where the word ' brass' occurs in Scripture, except where it refers to an ore, such as Job xxviii, 2 and Deut. viii, 9, it should be translated bronze" {Mctuls of the Bible, p. 66). Arms (2 Sam. xxi, 16 ; Job XX, 24; Psa. xviii, 34) and armor (1 Sam. xvii, 5, 6, 38) were made of this metal, which was capable of being so wrought as to admit of a keen and hard edge. The Egyptians employed it in cutting the hardest gran- ite. The Mexicans, before the discovery of iron, " found a substitute in an alloy of tin and copper; and with tools made of this bronze they could cut not only metals, but, with the aid of silicious dust, the hardest substances, as basalt, porphjTy, amethysts, and emeralds" (Prescott, Cunq. of Mr.rico, ch. v). The great skill attained by the Egyptians in working metals at a very early period throws light upon the remarkable facility with which the Israelites, during their wanderings in the desert, elaborated the works of art connected with the structure
of the Tabernacle, for which great acquaintance with metals was requisite. In the troublous times which fol- lowed their entrance into Palestine this knowledge seems to have been lost, for when the Temple was built the metal-workers employed were Phoenicians. See Copper.
Iron, like copper, was found in the hills of Palestine, The " iron mountain" in the trans-Jordanic region is de- scribed by Josephus ( War, iv, 8, 2), and was remarka- ble for producing a particular kind of palm (Mishna, Succa, ed. Dachs, p. 182). Iron mines are still worked by the inhabitants of Kefr Huneh in the S. of the valley Zaharani; smelting-works are found at Shemuster, three hours W. of Baalbek, and others in the oak-woods at Masbek (Kitter, Erdkumle, xvii, 73, 201) ; but the method employed is the simplest possible, like that of the old Samothracians, and the iron so obtained is chiefly used for horse-shoes. See Iron.
Tin and lead were both known at a very early period, though there is no distinct trace of them in Palestine. The former was among the spoils of the Midianites (Numb, xxxi, 22), who might have obtained it in their intercourse with the Phoenician merchants (comp. Gen. xxxvii, 25, 36), who themselves procured it from Tar- shish (Ezek. xxvii, 12) and the tin countries of the West. The allusions to it in the Old Testament principally point to its admixture with the ores of the precious metals (Isa. i, 25 ; Ezek. xxii, 18, 20). It must have oc- curred in the composition of bronze : the Assyrian bowls and dishes in the British Museum are found to contain one part of tin to ten of copper. " The tin was probably obtained from Phoenicia, and consequently that used in the bronzes in the British ]\Iuseum may actually have been exported, nearly three thousand years ago, from the British Isles" (Layard, Nin. and Bab. p. 191). See Lead; Tix.
Antimony (2 Kings ix, 30 ; Jer. iv, 30; A. V. "paint- ing"), in the form of powder, was used by the Hebrew women, like the kohl of the Arabs, for coloring their eye- lids and eyebrows. See Paint.