Laurion: The Minerals in the Ancient Slags

Authors:

Piet Gelaud, Piet van Kalmthout, and Christian Rewitzer.

What's in the book?

This soft cover book provides a detailed over view of the many minerals formed in the nine ancient slag dumps from the mining at Laurion in Greece.

The book provides great descriptions of the various ore deposits of Laurian and provides a brief description of both the history of mining and smelting operations going back some 5000 years. The authors take us back the Peleponnesian Wars and earlier.

There are many color photographs of most of the known minerals found here together with maps and crystal drawings. There is also a discussion of the different types of slags found at the various sites.

The minerals are arranged in the usual order of elements, sulphides, halides, hydroxides, carbonates, sulphates, arsenates and silicates.

Perhaps the most unusual feature of the book is that is written in four languages: English, French, German and Dutch.

The descriptions of each mineral include its chemical composition, crystal system, colours and associated minerals.
All in all this book is a very useful guide that can be used in identifying the amazing array of minerals found here.

Availability

The book is published by Janssen Print, The Netherlands, 1996. The book, although published in 1996, is readily available on-line from various sources such as Amazon.

Who should buy the book?

Anyone with an interest in these unusual minerals, any species mineral collector, and photographers. Most of these minerals tend to be micro minerals so this book is a particularly valuable aid for all micromount collectors.