Agricola, which seems to have been the classical academic pen‐name for Georg Bauer, was born at Glauchau, Germany, on March 24, 1494 as the son of a dyer and draper. He studied at Leipzig University and trained as a doctor, and became Town Physician to the Saxon mining community of Chemnitz. His significance derives from his great treatise on metal mining, De Re Metallica (1556), or “On Things of Metal.” This sumptuously illustrated work was a masterly study of all aspects of mining, including geology, stratigraphy, pictures of mineshafts, machinery, smelting foundries, and even the diseases suffered by miners.
Book III of De Re Metallicacontains a description and details of how to use the miner's compass which, by 1556, seems to have been a well‐established technical aid to the industry. Agricola drew a parallel between the miner's and the mariner's compass, saying that the direction cards of both were divided into equidistant divisions in accordance with a system of “winds.”...
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Bibliography
Agricola, G., De Re Metallica (Basilae, 1556), translated by Hoover, H.C., and Hoover, L.H. (1912; Dover Edition, New York, 1950).
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Chapman, A. (2007). Agricola, Georgius (1494–1555). In: Gubbins, D., Herrero-Bervera, E. (eds) Encyclopedia of Geomagnetism and Paleomagnetism. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4423-6_2
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