Silver is a precious metal that has been used by humans since the dawn of civilization. In this first part of a two part series we will look at the early history of silver. Old World Silver (4000 BC - 1500 AD)
The area of Anatolia (modern Turkey) is considered the first major source of mined silver. It provided the resource to craftsman throughout Asia Minor. Silver from the Anatolian region largely served as the silver source for the Western cultures flourishing in the Near East, Crete, and Greece.
Silver craftsmanship was centered largely in Asia Minor and Greek Islands, along with areas of mainland Greece dominated by the Mycenaean culture. Asia Minor provided most of the supply for the flourishing silver market.
A concentrated effort to mine silver began sometime after 3000 B.C.
The first sophisticated processing of silver ore was attributed to the Chaldeans in about 2500 B.C., who used a "cupellation" process to extract silver from lead-silver ores.
The need for traditional silver resulted in the location and exploitation of silver deposits in what is now Armenia. After the catastrophic destruction of the Minoan (Cretan) civilization in 1600 B.C. and the decline of the Mycenaean culture around 1200 B.C., the focus of silver production changed.
The mines of Laurium (near Athens) became the leading production center and provided silver for the burgeoning Greek civilization. The silver trade throughout Asia Minor and North Africa expanded significantly after the 8th century B.C. The Laurium mines were highly productive; estimates from historical writings and physical evidence from old mine dumps indicate silver production to have been about 1 million troy ounces per year at Laurium during the height if production (600 B.C. to 300 B.C.).
For about 1,000 years ending around the 1st century A.D., the Laurium mines were the largest individual source of world silver production. Outside the Laurium mines, production was concentrated mainly in Asia Minor, Sardinia, other Grecian locations and, to a limited extent, in Asia.
The period following the heyday of Greek mining in Laurium included the Carthaginians exploitation of Spanish silver. After the Punic Wars, the Romans replaced the Carthaginians as the exploiters of Spanish silver and extended their silver mining to other areas of continental Europe.
Spanish mines were a critically important source of silver for nearly 1,000 years, though their exploitation was halted temporarily by the Moorish conquest of Spain in the 8th century A.D.
Spanish mines not only provided a substantial portion of domestic needs of the Roman Empire until 476 A.D. They also served as a critical source of silver for the Asian spice trade. To meet the burgeoning trading requirements, Greece, Asia Minor, and Italy supplemented the Spanish production.
The Moorish invasion of Spain necessitated that the exploitation of silver move to a broader spectrum of countries, principally in Central Europe. Several major silver mine discoveries were made between 750 and 1200 A.D., including the classic Schemnitz, Rammelsburg, Goslar, and Saxony regions in Germany. Discoveries of silver were also made in Austria-Hungary and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
Although mine production in Spain dominated the first 1,000 years A.D., it was balanced by the decline in production at Laurium and Asia Minor. The real expansion in production occurred in the 500-year period from 1000-1500 A.D., when the number of mining locations and, to a lesser extent, the improvements in mining and processing technology occurred.
A major area of silver production was the discovery of the New World in 1492, after which time major silver mines in Mexico, Bolivia, and Peru were opened, leading to a rapid rise in the annual world production of silver.
This rise, coupled with improved techniques for extracting silver from ore, broadened both the quality and quantity of ore that could be exploited. Later improvements, particularly in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, vastly enhanced the base of silver production and accelerated the exploitation of silver as a byproduct of base-metal mining.
Only about 25 percent of cumulative world silver production occurred before the 1770s.
In the next article we will look at New World production of silver and its role in the silver industry.
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