KING SOLOMON’S MINES OR NOT?

Dunstan Times, Issue 3113, 17 April 1922, Page 7

KING SOLOMON’S MINES OR NOT?

Rhodesia, or British tfambesia, now .seeking admission to the Union of South Africa, ranks among the chief gold-hearing countries of th| world. The ancients mined and carried away enormous quantities of the precious metal, but under the scientific mining sy-steinis of the present day their operations will he greatly surpassed. Perhaps Rhodesia was the ancient land of Ophir, the land of the mysterious “King Solomon’s mines,” hut the theory is strongly combated hy some investigators. The ancient gold workings arc the hams of modern workings. For every ten square miles of Rhodesia there was one ancient mine: that is. there are 7o,()()(! old holes, which means that stupendous* wealth was dug out of the earth in those remote days. Much of this wealth must have gone to the north and east.

Experts assure ns that the ancient smelling furnaces are still easy to recognise. They are mink into the ground. Tlio furnace blowpipes are made of the finest granite powder cement, and the nozzles of the blowpipes' are coyored with splashes of gold. When the first lining became worn hy the heat a fresh lining of cement of an excellent finality which has outlasted lime was smeared around on top of the old lining. One can take an old lining, split off the layers with a knife, and find gold splashes in abundance. Apparently the anciets wasted gold lavishlv. Gold has been found in large quantities in the form of pellets as large as buckshot near the furnaces, and also thrown away on the debris heaps outside

The. tools of llii' ancient workers which have so far been discovered include a small soapstone hammer and burnishing stones of water-worn rock.

to which gold still adheres. There are evidences that the ancients carried on an extensive industry in the manufacciire 1 of gold ornaments and utensils Thirty-five thousand dollars’ worth of gehl ornaments were taken in five years