Subsequently, in 1546, when Gonzalo Pizarro, in opposition to the crown, was master of Peru, large quantities of metal were extracted by his general Francisco de Carbajal. So rich were the veins opened at Potosí that almost all other mines were abandoned as unprofitable, and so common became this metal that iron at Potosi was worth nearly its weight in silver.
According to Zárate the ore was melted in small round furnaces fed by charcoal and sheep's excrements, without the aid of bellows. The best ore was nearly pure silver, and the poorest eighty marks per one hundred pounds. The Pizarros worked these mines wdth Indians, who were obliged to pay to their proprietors two marks or one pound of silver each per day. All over this sum was their own. Over seven thousand Indians were. thus employed. Some of them made much more for themselves than for their masters, and many were worth from three to four thousand Castellanos.[1]
The Indian method in Peru was to dig a ditch along the side of a river, into which they threw the gold-bearing earth. Then turning in the water the dirt was carried away and the gold remained. "This," says the Spanish captain, "I have often seen done."[2]
By the beginning of the seventeenth century the product of the precious meta/ls in Peru was $11,000,000 per annum. The immense treasure secured by the conquerors had directed thither the attention of
- ↑ According to Pizarro y Orellana, these were the first mines worked in Peru. 'Traxo consigo muchos capitanes y caciques que descubrieron secretos de minas de oro, y de plata finissima, que fueron, las primeras que por industria deste raleroso capilan se abrieron en aquellos ricos Imperio. Y pareciendo à Hernando Pizarro, que convenia al servicio de dios, y de su Magestad fundar alli un pueblo, dexó la gente, repartiendo las minas, las mejores para su Magestad, y entre el, y los demas capitanes y soldados las demas.' Varones Iustres, 3.35.
- ↑ 'Disse di piu il cacique, che l'oro che si caua di quel firme, non lo ricogliono con bateas, che sono a modo d'vno bacil da barbiere, con li manichi doue lauano l'oro nell 'acqua, anzi fanno in questo modo, che met tono la terra cauata della mínera, in vn luogo a modo d'una fossa appresso l'acqua, e con vna ruota cauano l'acqua del fiume, e la fanno andar in quella fossi, c cosi. lauano la terra.' Relatione d'un Capitano Spaqnuolo, Ramusio, iii. 378.
