Johann Beckmann - A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume I (of 2)

Sueton. Vita Calig. cap. 39.

Petr. Victor. De Regionibus urbis Romæ.

Digestorum lib. xxxiii. tit. 7, 18, Cum de lanienis.

Cod. Theodos. lib. ix. tit. 40, 3, or l. 3, Quicunque. C. Th. de pœnis.

Cod. Theodos. lib. xiv. tit. 3, 7, or l. 7. Post quinquennii, C. Th. de pistoribus. We are told in 1778 that there are no other mills in Sardinia than such as are driven by asses. See Fran. Cetti, Quadrupedi di Sardegna. Sessati, 1778, 8vo.

Cod. Theodos. lib. xiv. tit. 15, 4; and Cod. Justin, lib. xi. tit. 42, 10. Many things relating to the same subject may be found in Cassiodorus.

Procopius, Gothicorum lib. i. c. 9. Fabretti Diss. de aquis et aquæductibus vet. Romæ, p. 176. Grævii Thesaur. Antiq. Rom. iv. p. 1677.

The account of Procopius, in the first book of the War of the Goths, deserves to be here given at length: – “When these aqueducts were cut off by the enemy, as the mills were stopped for want of water, and as cattle could not be found to drive them, the Romans, closely besieged, were deprived of every kind of food (for with the utmost care they could scarcely find provender for their horses). Belisarius however being a man of great ingenuity devised a remedy for this distress. Below the bridge which reaches to the walls of Janiculum, he extended ropes well-fastened, and stretched across the river from both banks. To these he affixed two boats of equal size, at the distance of two feet from each other, where the current flowed with the greatest velocity under the arch of the bridge, and placing large mill-stones in one of the boats, suspended in the middle space a machine by which they were turned. He constructed at certain intervals on the river, other machines of the like kind, which being put in motion by the force of the water that ran below them, drove as many mills as were necessary to grind provisions for the city,” &c.

“Si quis ingenuus annonam in molino furaverit… Si quis sclusam de farinario alieno ruperit… Si quis ferramentum de molino alieno furaverit…” – Leges Francorum Salicæ, edit. Eccardi, Francof. et Lipsiæ 1720, fol. p. 51. Sclusa is translated sluice , and there is no doubt that the French word escluse is derived from it. All these words come from schliessen to shut up, or the Low Saxon schluten : but by that word in these laws we can hardly understand those expensive works which we at present call sluices, but probably wickets and what else belonged to the dam. Lex Wisigothorum, lib. viii. tit. 4, 30, may serve further to illustrate this subject: “De confringentibus molina et conclusiones aquarum. Si quis molina violenter effregerit, quod fregit intra triginta dies reparare cogatur. – Eadem et de stagnis, quæ sunt circa molina conclusiones aquarum, præcipimus custodire.” The sclusæ are here called conclusiones aquarum , to which belong also the mounds or dykes. See Corpus Juris Germanici Antiqui, ed. Georgisch. Halæ 1738, 4to, p. 2097. Gregory of Tours calls them exclusas . But what is ferramentum ? The iron-work of our mills cannot be so easily stolen as to render it necessary to secure them by particular laws.

Auson. Mosella, v. 362. Fortunati Carmina, Moguntiæ 1617, 4to, p. 83.

Gregorii Turonensis Opera, Paris, 1699, fol. Hist. lib. iii. 19, p. 126. Ibid. Vita Patrum, 18, p. 1242.

Gul. Britonis Philippidos libri xii. lib. vi. v. 220.

Chronicon Hierosolymitanum, edit. a Reineccio. Helms. 1584, 4to, lib. i. c. 10.

See Carpentieri Gloss. Nov. ad Scriptores medii, ævi, (Supp. ad Ducang.) Paris, 1766, fol. vol. i. p. 266. In a chronicle written in the year 1290, a floating-mill is called molendinum navale , also navencum ; and in another chronicle of 1301, molendinum pendens .

Damiani Opera, ed. Cajetani. Paris, 1743, fol. i. p. 105, lib. vi. epist. 23.

Dell’ Origine di alcune Arti Principali Appresso i Veneziani. Ven. 1758, 4to, p. 71.

Dialog. i. 2.

Histor. Francorum, lib. ix. 38, p. 462.

See Pomponius Sabinus, ut supra .

Lib. ix. c. 9; x. c. 1, 13.

Natur. Quæst. lib. v. c. 18.

Chrysost. in Psalm. cxxxiv. p. 362.

“At the same period (718) one named Halek the son of Uladi the weak, built close to the city an ingenious mill which was driven by water. It was visited by many Bohemians, in whom it excited much wonder, and who taking it as a model, built others of the like kind here and there on the rivers; for before that time all the Bohemian mills were wind-mills, erected on mountains.” – Wenceslai Hagecii Chronic. Bohem. translated into German by John Sandel. Nuremberg, 1697, fol. p. 13.

See De la Mare, Traité de la Police, &c. ut supra . – Déscription du Duché de Bourgogne. Dijon, 1775, 8vo, i. p. 163. – Dictionnaire des Origines, par d’Origny, v. p. 184. The last work has an attracting title, but it is the worst of its kind, written without correctness or judgement, and without giving authorities.

There are no wind-mills at Ispahan nor in any part of Persia. The mills are all driven by water, by the hand, or by cattle. Voyages de Chardin. Rouen, 1723, 8vo, viii. p. 221. – The Arabs have no wind-mills; these are used in the East only in places where no streams are to be found; and in most parts the people make use of hand-mills. Those which I saw on Mount Lebanon and Mount Carmel had a great resemblance to those which are found in many parts of Italy. They are exceedingly simple and cost very little. The mill-stone and the wheel are fastened to the same axis. The wheel, if it can be so called, consists of eight hollow boards shaped like a shovel, placed across the axis. When the water falls with violence upon these boards it turns them round and puts in motion the mill-stone over which the corn is poured. – Darvieux, Reisen, Part iii. Copenh. 1754, 8vo. I did not see either water- or wind-mills in all Arabia. I however found an oil-press at Tehama, which was driven by oxen; and thence suppose that the Arabs have corn-mills of the like kind. – Niebuhr, p. 217.

Mabillon, Annales Ord. Benedicti. Paris, 1713, fol. p. 474.

Dugdale, Mon. i. p. 816. – The letter of donation, which appears also to be of the twelfth century, may be found in the same collection, ii. p. 459. In it occurs the expression molendinum ventriticum . In a charter also in vol. iii. p. 107, we read of molendinum ventorium . See Dugdale’s Monasticon, ed. nov. vol. v. p. 431–442.

Decretal Greg. lib. iii. tit. 30. c. 23.

Zanetti, ut supra .

Lehmann’s Chronica der Stadt Speyer. Frankf. 1662, 4to, p. 847. “Sent to the Netherlands for a miller who could grind with the wind-mill.”

Descriptions and figures of both kinds may be found in Leupold’s Theatrum Machinarum Generale. Leipzig, 1724, fol. p. 101, tab. 41, 42, 43.