Jason and the Gold Rush

by J. W. BARNES

The Editor,

Dear Sir,

A recent article in Nature presented evidence that a breed of fine-woolledsheep roamed part of the Black Sea region during the fifth century B.C.

(Ryder & Hedges, 1973,480). In passing the authors suggested that thesesheep may have led to the legend of Jason's search for the 'Golden Fleece',a legend they imply was of about that date. Further comment on the ideais given in the Science Report of The Times of 13 April 1973, which saysthat flocks of such rare and valuable sheep would be jealously guarded,and that it is quite easy to see how a legend could grow. Interesting thoughthis conclusion is, a more acceptable explanation, at least to a geologist,is that the Golden Fleece was in fact just that: it was a sheep's fleece im­pregnated with gold dust. Sheep, goat and other animal skins have linedsluice-boxes used for the recovery of alluvial gold probably from theearliest times. Indeed, they were still in use in some parts of the world untilquite recently, although coconut matting, corduroy and even coarsecanvas catch the finer gold today. This interpretation is by no means new.Leaf (1912, 294) states that '... all antiquity explained [the Fleece] by thegold dust of the [river] Phasis', Strabo, writing in the first century A.D., iseven more specific and says (xi.2.19) that the Soanes in the mountains ofColchis collect the gold carried down by the streams in 'perforated troughsand fleecy skins': what better description of a lined sluice-box, with agravel dump-box at its head, can we expect of a layman? Rickard (1932,1047) considers the use of fleeces in mining even more significant, for hepoints out that the natural grease in a fleece helps to retain the gold, and'... thus the most modern of metallurgical methods-the flotation process-is implicit in the story ofthe Argonauts .. .', but that is going too far!

metes' kingdom of Colchis, where the River Phasis flowed, was the homeof the Fleece and Jason's destination. It lay at the eastern extremity of theBlack Sea, just north of what is now Batum, '... where for ships is thefarthermost run .. .' (Strabo, xi.2.16), and it produced not only gold but,according to Theophrastus, who wrote in the fourth century B.C., cinnabartoo. The inhabitants of the region in Strabo's time did not meet with thatgreat geographer's approval, for he noted that the gold-collecting Soaneswere remarkable for their filthiness (xi.2.19).Whatever their lack of hygiene,these people were miners, they collected gold, and they did it with fleeces.This surely must establish the strong probability that the Golden Fleecesought by Jason, although centuries before the time of Strabo or even

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Theophrastus, was a symbol of placer mining in the eastern Euxine, andwas not a reference to a certain breed of sheep.

What of Jason's voyage itself? Was this epic merely the compressed andromanticised account of some ancient gold rush to the eastern end of theBlack Sea? Can it be coincidence that the adventures of the Argo's crewshould be so similar to those suffered by the prospectors who journeyedto the Klondike in 1896? Even 'Soapy' Smith, the belligerent mayor ofSkagway, has his counterpart in King Amycus, who challenged all whoentered his kingdom. Legend makes heroes of the Argonauts, yet they cameto take the Fleece by force of guile, and, having got it, left hotly pursued , a

Fig . 1. Map of south-east Europe, the Black Sea and Asia Minor. Jason 's route toColch is is shown by the dotted line

pursu it they delayed by the most unsavoury means. But they were notheroes to all: an 'outrage', Herodotus called it (i. 2-7). Were the Argonautsany different from other claim-jumpers who throughout history havedescended on gold-diggings to grab what they could before being drivenoff by the irate legal miners?

When did these events occur? They were certainly long before the fifthcentury B.C., the date suggested by Ryder & Hedges (1973). Greek settle­ments were well established on the Pontic coast by then, including Trapezus(Trabzon, Trebizond), only 120 miles from Colchis. Homer (c. 800 B.C .)

makes little reference to the Argo's voyage although he does tell us that

PROC. GEOL. ASS., VOL. 14, PART 4,1973 32

484 CORRESPONDENCE

Jason 's son brought wine to the Greeks investing Troy (Iliad: vii. 461 ff.).By Homeric times Greek ships were sailing the southern Black Sea shores'vermilion cheeked', their paint the red mercuric sulphide mineral cinnabar.This pigment was a valuable article of trade, mined at Sizma in centralAnatolia, and exported from Cinab (Sinop), from which it got its name(Leaf, 1912, 299; Barnes & Bailey, 1972, 55). By then the Black Sea hadbecome an important trading outlet from central Asia and Leaf (1912,295),maintains this had been so since well before the fallofTroy . Thus ships pliedtheir trade east and west beneath the loom of the Pontic mountains whichsweep down to the almost shoreless coast . These were the mountainswhich Strabo, quoting Homer, called 'the birthplace of silver' (xii.3.20),for it was here that lead was probably first cupelled to extract its preciousmetal. It was this silver that, before the fall of Troy, the Hittites mined andexported along the coast, for they were the major suppliers of the ancientworld. But not only were the Pontics silver-rich, they produced coppertoo, and this was also shipped westwards, to be taxed by Troy as it passedthrough the Hellespont. It was here, too, that the Hittites invented thesmelting of iron, an art passed down to the Chalybes of Homer's time, andChalybean iron was famous for its quality. Surely a coast so commerciallyactive would have figured largely in Jason's narrative if it had been flourish­ing in his time, but it does not do so, nor are other ships encountered untilColchis is reached. In the Aegean the Argo navigated a recognisable geo­graphy, but '... beyond Propontis (Marmara) there is nothing in the Argolegend which bears any relation to reality ' (Leaf, 1912,327). Huxley (1969,72) maintains that geographical details that are not mentioned in the earlyversions of the legend were added by the geographer Hekataios in the mid­seventh century B.C. More were added by Apollonius in the third centuryB.C. when he wrote his own epic poem of the voyage, and by that timethe Greeks had been sailing the coast since the fall of Troy , nearly athousand years before. One must assume that Jason sailed a coast un­known to the Greeks of his time, with the shores apparently unsettled bycolonists. Bacon (1935, 142) suggested 1600 B.C. as the earliest likely datefor the voyage, but by then the Hittites must surely have established them­selves on at least the south-eastem Black Sea coast for they had occupiedthe highlands just behind it for over three hundred years. A Hittiteinscription dated at 1680 B.C. says of their king, 'Labarnes . . . made theseas his frontier' (Gurney, 1966,21). A date before 1600B.C. would appearto satisfy the conditions better.

The epic of the search for the Golden Fleece is our first account of aprospecting venture, claim-jumping though it may have been, and ending,so typically in a mining camp, with the seduction of Medea, the mineowner's daughter. It also establishes that lined sluices were used to recovergold at a very early date. Sheep stealing had nothing to do with it.

CORRESPONDENCE

REFERENCES

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ApOLLONIUS OF RHODES. The Voyage of Argo. Transl. E. V. Rieu, 1971, 2nd ed.Penguin Classics, London.

BACON, J. R. 1925. The Voyage of the Argonauts. Methuen, London.BARNES, J. W. & E. H. BAILEY. 1972. Turkey's Major Mercury Mine-How it was

Mined 8000 Years Ago. World Mining, 25 (4), European edition, 49-55.GURNEY, O. R. 1966. The Hittites. Pelican, London.HERODOTUS. The Histories. Transl. A. de Selincourt, 1972, revised ed. Penguin

Classics, London.HOMER. The Iliad. Transl. E. V. Rieu, 1972. Penguin London.HUXLEY, G. L. 1969. Greek Epic Poetry. Faber, London.LEAF, W. 1912. Troy-A Study in Homeric Geography. Macmillan, London.RICKARD, T. A. 1932. Man and Metals. 2. Whittlesey House, London.RYDER, M. L. & J. W. HEDGES. 1973. Ancient Scythian wool from the Crimea. Nature,

242,480.STRABO. The Geography ofStrabo. Transl. H. L. Jones, 1929. 5. Heinemann, London.

J. W. BarnesDepartment of Geology and OceanographyUniversity College of SwanseaSingleton ParkSwansea SA2 8PP