Agricola, Georgius, De re metallica, 1912/1950

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            <p type="main">
              <s>
                <pb pagenum="546"/>
              salt.
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              1
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              While the salt-water contained in the salt-pits is being heated by the sun,
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              if they be flooded with great and frequent showers of rain the evaporation is
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              hindered. </s>
              <s>If this happens rarely, the salt acquires a disagreeable
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              2
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              flavour, and
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              in this case the salt-pits have to be filled with other sweet water.</s>
            </p>
            <p type="main">
              <s>Salt from sea-water is made in the following manner. </s>
              <s>Near that part
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              of the seashore where there is a quiet pool, and there are wide, level plains
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              which the inundations of the sea do not overflow, three, four, five, or six
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              trenches are dug six feet wide, twelve feet deep, and six hundred feet long,
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              or longer if the level place extends for a longer distance; they are two hundred
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              feet distant from one another; between these are three transverse trenches.
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              </s>
              <s>Then are dug the principal pits, so that when the water has been raised from
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              the pool it can flow into the trenches, and from thence into the salt-pits,
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              of which there are numbers on the level ground between the trenches. </s>
              <s>The
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              salt-pits are basins dug to a moderate depth; these are banked round with
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              the earth which was dug in sinking them or in cleansing them, so that between
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              the basins, earth walls are made a foot high, which retain the water let into
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              them. </s>
              <s>The trenches have openings, through which the first basins receive
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              the water; these basins also have openings, through which the water flows
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              again from one into the other. </s>
              <s>There should be a slight fall, so that the
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              water may flow from one basin into the other, and can thus be replenished.
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              </s>
              <s>All these things having been done rightly and in order, the gate is raised that
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              opens the mouth of the pool which contains sea-water mixed with rain-water
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              or river-water; and thus all of the trenches are filled. </s>
              <s>Then the gates of the
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              first basins are opened, and thus the remaining basins are filled with the
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              water from the first; when this salt-water condenses, all these basins are
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              incrusted, and thus made clean from earthy matter. </s>
              <s>Then again the first
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              basins are filled up from the nearest trench with the same kind of water,
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              and left until much of the thin liquid is converted into vapour by the heat
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              of the sun and dissipated, and the remainder is considerably thickened. </s>
              <s>Then
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              their gates being opened, the water passes into the second basins; and
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              when it has remained there for a certain space of time the gates are opened,
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              so that it flows into the third basins, where it is all condensed into salt.
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              </s>
              <s>After the salt has been taken out, the basins are filled again and again with
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              sea-water. </s>
              <s>The salt is raked up with wooden rakes and thrown out with
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              shovels.</s>
            </p>
            <p type="main">
              <s>Salt-water is also boiled in pans, placed in sheds near the wells from
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              which it is drawn. </s>
              <s>Each shed is usually named from some animal or other
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              thing which is pictured on a tablet nailed to it. </s>
              <s>The walls of these sheds
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              are made either from baked earth or from wicker work covered with thick
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              </s>
            </p>
          </chap>
        </body>
      </text>
    </archimedes>
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