make Baths hot in Fountains To this end the whole Earth is Cavernous and the Terrene Globe contains vast spaces within its own bowels arched Caves and Vaults immense Tracts and impenetrable Abysses For as Seneca relates of the Fields of Puteolum There are vast Caves hugh Recesses and vacuities Stones on Mountains hanging here and there Also cragged Gapings without bottom which have often receiv'd them as they fell in and buried the mighty Ruine in the deep For the whole Earth is not solid but every where gaping and hollow'd with empty rooms and spaces and hidden burrows as it were whereto subscribes Pliny Aelian Lucretius and other writers of Natural things For the Fire and Water sweetly conspire together in mutual service with an inviolable friendship and wedlock for the good of the whole in their several and distinct private-lodgings as we may so say and hidden receptacles spreading themselves far and wide to a vast largeness and capacity which two Associates and Agents of Nature with pains work and bring about such variety of things we see of Minerals Juyces Marles Glebes and other soyls with ebullitions and bublings up of Fountains also As Manilius but now sang to us Sith this fire thus shut up in the Caverns of the Earth agitating it self when it finds passage it never leaves penetrating unto some vent for many hundred Miles even under the Sea and unpassable and far fetch'd windings and turnings of the Earth And acquiring continually greater power it turns the Earth and even the very Stones and Mountains it finds in its way into easie fuel and nutriment That except it were restrain'd by the encompassing of the Ocean and the command of the Omnipotent Deity it would attract and suck in the universal bulk of all elementary Nature into an unquenchable combustion and Conflagration And there is need of such vast quantities of fires for the uses of the Universe And 't is reasonable to think that the Divine Providence hath made a very great provision of fire in the belly of Nature whence by long Chimnyes or Funnels as it were it might diffuse an infinite heat and fervour for the use of things necessary and the emolument of the Earth Men and Beasts Just as it hath constituted the vast Sea in such a manner so as to distribute an indeficient plenty of Waters through the veins and channels of the whole body of the Earth And as it hath appointed the Waters their bounds so it hath so attempted and distributed these fires in the hidden courses and apartments of subterrestrial Nature that they might neither be suffocated by the infinuating and inflowing Waters of the Ocean nor transgress their prescribed Limits and Confines For otherwise if they should be unlimitted Eruptions they would soon turn all into Ruines Which shall at length come to pass in that fulness of time when all the Reins of unruly Nature shall be broke loose and the Cataracts or Flood gates as it were of subterraneous fire flung open by the command of the Divine Power not only the Earth but even the Elements shall melt with fervent heat to the ruine and destruction of the whole World That even as in the universal Flood the windows of Heaven and Gulphs of the Abysses being opened he destroyed the World by an Inundation of Waters even so also in the last times he might destroy the same by a Deluge of Fires which who could deny to be if he should behold the perpetual boyling fires in the Earth the vast burning of Provinces Lastly the manifest provision and preparation of so much Combustible matter and Sulphur together which is vomited forth even at one Gaping and Eructation without confessing it a certain and infallible Specimen and Example and evident token of preparation to the total and final Conflagration prescribed by the Divine Wisdom The Prodigious Vulcano's therefore and Fire-vomitting Mountains visible in the external surface of the Earth do sufficiently demonstrate it full of invisible and under-ground fires For where-ever there 's a Vulcan there also is a Conservatory or Store-house under as certain as where there is a Chimney or smoke there is fire And argue deeper treasuries and storehouses of fire in the very heart and inward bowels of the Earth In so much that from hence the Holy Father's have not incongruously placed the greatest of all the Fire-conservative Abysses in the Centre of the Earth for an eternal Jakes and Prison destin'd for the punishment of the Damned and some others for Purgatory according to the received belief of Papists Now flame is but flowing or fluid fire and the streaming efflux of sulphurous principles or particles c. which from these burst forth in excessive raging streams from the mouth of these Ignivomous or fire-vomitting Mountains and Vulcano's which are wonders of Nature not unworthy generally to be known and taken notice of of all men And which we now come to ennumerate with their remarkable Phaenomena's and Eruptions CHAP. II. Of Vulcano's ingeneral What and where In Asia Africa America and Europe AS Nature hath constituted various Store-houses of Waters in the highest Mountains so it has distributed various Receptacles of fire within the bowels of the highest Mountains also for the compleat fructifying of Nature with this primigenial heat as it were and radical moisture together as before has been shewn For the fire cannot subsist without the water nor the water without the fire 'T is certain if only the moist or only the fiery element should domineer all would be laid wast and nothing fructifie c. The Water would stagnete and freeze without some kindly resolving heat and afford no warm and friendly vapours and fruitful exhalations And the fire cannot live without a moist and humid nutriment or last any time without a free and an asswaging fomentation and breathing of the Air and as it were ventilation These Vulcano's therefore are nothing but the vent-holes or breath-pipes of Nature to give vent to the superfluous choaking fumes and smoaky vapours which fly upwards and make way and free passage for the vehemency of the within-conceived burning and for the attraction and free entrance of the friendly cherishing Air to revive and ventilate those suffocating flames lest they should continually shake the foundations of the Ground with intollerable commotions and Earthquakes For Earthquakes are the proper effects of subterrestrial cumbustions And so the fire is both exonerated of its superfluous clogg of fumes and dregs of dross through those open and wide-mouthed Gulphs and Orifices as it were through certain Jakes or common shoars and also cherished and refreshed with the all-reviving Air so serving as breath pipes both for expiration and inspiration to the whole body of Nature or the Universe Of this sort of Vent-holes Chimneys or Funnels there are such a multitude and variety that there 's hardly any Region in the world without them Asia every where in its several
hath already been inculcated and joyning its fat and humid to the hot and dry lodging under Sulphureous Glebes in the intimate bosoms of the Earth restores that which is consum'd away with an uncessant conception and birth of a new generation But in the external surface by vapours attracted from the Sea and which are fruitful and even big with the said new Geniture or Generation of the Sea it lies within the porous Hives or Cells of the now burnt matter through the Snows Hails Rains mixt with the Dust and Ashes a new Geniture or Conception which in its time the matter being now mature and ripe may at length break forth into great Burnings You see therefore the wonderful and indeficient Circulation of Nature in its operations Corallary III. From these things it follows that the formal cause of the Burnings of this Mountain is the Fire it self The material Sulphur and Salt Nitre Bitumen and the like matters apt to cherish Fires propagated by a perpetual motion from the intimate dark recesses of the Earth and also from the incumbent Sea plying thereon The Instrumental the Gavernous nature of the place and the whole Body or Bulk of the Mountain wholly full of Burrows and hanging together aloft and pois'd of it self and perpetually burdened and oppressed with Sulphureous Smoak and Soot Lastly the efficient cause are Winds and Blasts which flowing out of the most inward Caverns at this kind of vent or issue and as it were at their proper gorges and open jaws exuscitate with certain Bellows as we may so say the dorment Fires to enkindle the matter whatsoever shall be found next Sith all Sicily is wholly bored through with innumerable Caverns and Burrows as was before mention'd Else where we have abundantly demonstrated the wounderful Ragings and Tides of the Sicilian Streight and the alterations of its flux and reslux and also the insatiable force of the devouring gulf of Seylla and Charybdis and how that it depends on the said Mountain being disposed after a wonderful way and manner in Subterraneous Shops and work-houses throughout the universal Islands Of which thing this may be a clear Testimony that Charybdis tumultuating after an unusual manner Aetna also withal rages at the same time being together with it stirred up with the Spirit of Sedition and tumult and the sulphureous dens recieving into themselves the more vehement winds and blasts thereby the combustible matter agitated and puffed no otherwise then as with Smith's Bellows burst forth violently into huge Globes of Flames But other winds blowing Aetna seems to take respit for that the orifices of the passages are plac'd in a contrary way to the current waves and flouds of the Sea and hindred by the neighbour Mountain But at the East and South winds blowing according to the constitution of the channels now Flames sometimes Smoke now and then Embers Sparkles and Flakes But sometimes the Fuel being augmented in it self it wonderfully rages with burnings with a formidable stream and floud of Fire and Brimstone which now and then it is wont to belch forth out of the inmost shops of the aestuaries of fire under ground with an huge destruction and ruine of the subjected Villages Fields Cities and Cattel The forerunners of which are groanings of the Caverns from intercepted and shut-up Spirits Roarings of the Sea joyn'd with trembling of the Earth By all which coming so thick together Nature as it were overpress'd and impatient of bonds breaks open all Prison Doors and Barrs and rushes any way it can get out and like a burning River or Floud consumes not only Fields with the mighty rouling stream wherewith it is poured down but also intire Villages overturns neighbouring Towns and Cities and every where leaving footsteps full of horrour devours Woods Rocks and Mountains and nothing is able to stand in its way Of which things the Monuments of Historians are full We conclude therefore the matter of Subterraneous Fire to be not only Sulphur Bitumen Pit-Coals but also Allom Salt Nitre Coaly Earth and Calcanthum or Vitriol and such kind of Metals For Sulphur and Bitumen do not make the Fire so impetuous as that Fire which subverts Mountains buries Cities in Ashes and the ejectments of Pumices and by an incredible violence belches out stony and Rocky Mountains out of the very Mountains as hath plainly appear'd from what hath preceded But some other thing must needs be adjoyned thereto to perform this effect which we go about to explain I say therefore that the universal matter of Subterraneous Fire ought to be sharp and thick or gross as Sulphureous and Bituminous matter are whereto is joyn'd with a great and necessary alliance of Commerce Salt-peter which having its substance replenished with most tumid spirits and joyn'd to Sulphur and enkindled whilst it finds no exit or vent it exercises that force upon the subterraneous obstacles that lye in its way which a little before we have expounded especially if crude Antimony and Mercurial Spirits be superadded as sufficiently appears from the mighty efficacy of Warlike Guns and Cannons Furthermore the combustible materials they are not found but in Subterraneous Dens of which sort are divers kinds of Stones various species of terrestrial Glebes Metallick Mixtures and Miscellanies of the other Minerals And besides these Salt Allom Salt-peter Salt-Ammoniack and whatsoever is there found even to the very Water it self And even Mountains and huge vast Stones are turned into matter and nutriment of the Fire Then forthwith the matter generated only burns and this being consumed away the Fire is extinguished and changing its station invades another near unto it as comes to pass in Bituminous Earths Then afterwards the consumed matter conceiving new Seeds springs again and a good while after is enkindled which indeed if it be by a sudden generation born again in great plenty as in Aetna Strumbolo the Phlegraean Plains then they will burn with an everlasting Fire But the Generation of such kind of matters is made after this manner The Sea replenished with fatness and unctuosity while it enters the hidden Rooms and Chambers of the Earth by and by nourishes anew the substantial parts of the Mountain extenuated with the Fire and replenishes their substance that hath lost its marrow and strength with a new fatness and if a way lie open into Sulphureous Vaults and Houses under ground the water being driven in will be turn'd into the nutriment of Sulphur If into Bituminous places into the nutriment of Bitumen if into Aluminous veins of Allom And so of the rest the same reason And thus the Substances destroyed by the Fire are repaired almost after the same way that Iron is renew'd again in the Island Elva the Mines for several years lying idle and fallow as it were and as stones which they call Travertine in the Fields of Tivoli But how the said matters should conceive fire was above-said As how indeed scarcely from the Sun not
An Imaginary Idea or Type of Subterraneous ffire houses whose Breath holes as it were the Vulcanian Mountains only are An Imaginary Idea or Type of Subterraneous ffire mixt with water and of the protrusion of waters through Subterraneous Aquaeducts out of the Sea and into the water houses of mountains the Concoction of Subterrestrial waters through ffire-ducts THE VULCANO'S OR Burning and Fire-vomiting MOUNTAINS Famous in the World VVith their REMARKABLES Collected for the most part out of KIRCHER'S Subterraneous World And expos'd to more general view in English upon the Relation of the late Wonderful and Prodigious Eruptions of AETNA Thereby to occasion greater admirations of the Wonders of Nature and of the God of Nature in the mighty Element of Fire Res semper aliquid apportat novi None sadlier knows the unresisted Ire Then Thou Poor London of th' all-raging Fire But these occasion'd kindlings are but Blazes To th' mighty Burnings which fierce Nature raises If then a Town or Hills blaze be so dire What will be th' last and universal Fire Licensed and Entred according to Order London Printed by J. Darby for John Allen and are to be sold by him at the White Horse in Wentworth Street near Bell Lane And by Benjamin Billingsly at the Printing-Press in Broad-street near Gresham-Colledg 1669. The Epistle to the READER HEre are presented to thee in English the most wonderful most prodigious and even miraculous Operations of Nature in the Geocosm or Terrestrial World 'T is confess'd 't is not an exact or compil'd History But rather a scatter'd Collection of Historical Relations by others of most remarkable passages Which so came to pass First upon so fair an occasion given by the late incredible Eruptions of Aetna and past all belief Had they not been confirmed by so honourable a Testimony past all mistrust And yet there were not wanting some such Persons so unknowing and faithless as to question notwithstanding at first all for a Rodamontado or Isle of Pines c. Therefore secondly also by reason of so general and universal Ignorance of these Matters found among our Countreymen as sufficiently appeared at the first coming forth of that wonderful Relation As if some such strange thing had hapned as never before in the World at least never so great so prodigious and portentous That therefore men might be more generally acquainted with the Wonders of Nature in this particular also of Fire has this been undertaken And then because there had yet been none in English of the Subject for the general information of men or of such as were desirious to know fuller of these matters And yet there is a method sufficient for an exact History Nor is there any thing Material or Remarkable that is not in brief at least taken notice of Lastly The Subject and Argument so admirable and curious may excuse other defects For that not so much the Philosophy of these Matters yet there is a sprinkling of that too as occasionally it occur'd in our Author as the mighty Effects and Things themselves are here intended for the English Reader 'T is therefore an Historical Narration of the Worlds Volcano's and their Wonders and Remarkables But for the grand Literado's and such as are past their English Tongue let them be satisfied that it was never calculated for men of their Degree and Elevation So not to weary thee with Complements of a long Epistle or to hang out Invitations of greater pretences then realities we leave thee to what entertainment the Book it self will afford And if thou findst any occasion not to repent of so much time and labour as the perusal By so much the farther will the Author be from repenting of his pains or thinking his labour lost that is for no good or benefit to his Countreymen in Englishing so wonderful things He presumes to say Read and admire and take the pleasure thereof Farewel The Explication of the Schemes out of Kircher I. THE Central Fire A through certain Fire-ducts or Channels diffuses round about every where far and near fiery exhalations and spirits These driven into the Water-houses it partly disposes into hot Baths partly attenuates or rarifies into vapours which dashing as it were against the Arches or Vaults of Concavous Dens and condens'd by the coldness of the place and lastly dissolved into Waters generate Fountains and Rivers and then partly derived into fit Matrices and Receptacles fruitful of other kind of Juyces of several Minerals contract fast together and harden into Metallick Bodies or else are ordered for a new Conception and fructifying of combustible Matter to nourish and still feed and maintain the Fire You see there also how the Sea by the Winds and pressure of the Air or motion of the aestuating Tides ejaculate and cast forth the Waters through Subterraneous or under-ground Burrows into the highest Water-houses of the Mountains You see also the Sea and the Plains in the utmost surface of the Earth to take place next to the Subterraneous World and the Air next to them as the Scheme teaches Yet you are not to imagine that the Fires and Waters c. are really thus disposed in Nature underground For whoever has seen them But this onely was to signifie according to the best imagination of the Author that they are after some well-ordered and artificial or organiz'd way or other contriv'd by Nature and that the Under-ground World is a well fram'd House with distinct Rooms Cellars and Store-houses by great Art and Wisdom fitted together and not as many think a confused and jumbled heap or Chaos of things as it were of Stones Bricks Wood and other Materials as the rubbish of a decayed House or an House not yet made And to the perpetuation of these hidden and unsearchable operations of Nature there is a constant circulation and return round thereof The Constellations Sun Moon and Stars cause the reciprocal slowings and Tides of the Sea to and fro By the impetuousness of the Seas rage and Tides an immense bulk of Waters being through hid and occult passages at the bottom of the Ocean protruded or thrust forcibly into the intimate bowels of the Earth excites and stirs up also Subterraneous Fire by the impetuousness of Winds and restores it with new conveyance of Nutriment The Subterraneous Fire not knowing how to be idle being enkindled by the reciprocation or return to and fro of the Tides as it were by certain Bellows and raging does by these and those and the other Fibres or Veins of occult passages which are replenished with Metallick and Mineral Juyces carry whiles it passes by an huge plenty of vapors with it self which protruded partly through the Terrestrial Conveyances of the Mountains partly through the bottom of the Ocean into the uttermost Surface and there dilated and spread wider do again with their blasts solicite and provoke the Air the Ocean and Seas And what is again insinuated through the Orifices of the Oceans bottom doth
convey new Provanr to the Subterraneous Fire to nourish and conserve it and by this means also doth supply new matter to provoke and stir up the Sea again as but now was declar'd You see therefore the manner and way of the Circulation of Nature You see how Water Fire Fire Water mutually as it were cherish one another and by a certain unanimous consent conspire to the Conservation of the Geocosm or Terrestrial World For if Subterraneous Fire should emit no vapours for matters of Winds The Sea as it were torpid and void of motion would go into a putridness to the ruine of the whole Globe And consequently destitute of the aid of Winds could neither also succour Subterraneous Fire with necessary nutriment Whence the Fire extinct being the life of the Macrocosm as spiritous blood is of the Microcosm Universal Nature must necessarily perish Lest therefore Nature undergoing so great a detriment should fail Hereupon God most good and great by provident Nature the Hand-maid of the Supream Work-master would have both Elements be in a perpetual Motion for admirable ends elsewhere shewn For the Water sliding through the secret passages under ground supplies moisture and together therewith carries a mixture of Terrestrial portions to the Fire-houses for their food And these again swelling with hot Spirits carried upwards and elevated through wonted Fire-ducts do with their heat cherish the Water-houses and other kind of Receptacles whether of Air or several Juyces of Minerals and Earths for there are Store-houses of all under ground and do animate them for the Generation both of Minerals and also of Vegetables to be promoted or furthered by exhalations And so in an everlasting and circulatory motion all things which are beheld in Nature do exist and abide And so Subterraneous Fire together with Water are the Effectors and Generators we may say of all things c. II. This Scheme expresses the Nests of Heat only or which is all one the Fire-houses variously distributed through the Universal Bowels of the Earth by the admirable Workmanship of God lest any where should be wanting what would be so greatly necessary to the Conversation of the Geocosm But let none perswade himself as if the Fires were constituted as here represented and the Fire-houses forthwith disposed in that order In no wise this We would onely hereby shew that the bowels of the Earth are full of Aestuaries that is places overflown and raging with Fire which we call Under-ground Fire-houses or Conservatories whether after such or any other manner disposed From the Centre therefore we have deduc'd the Fire through all the Paths to be supposed of the Terrestrial World even to the very Vulcanian Mountains themselves in the Exteriour Surface The Central Fire is signed with the letter A. The rest are the Aestuaries or Fire-houses signed with B. The Fire-ducts C. But the least Channels are Fissures or clests of the Earth which the Fiery Spirits pass and make their way through A. The Central Fire B. The Fire-houses C. The Fire-ducts Fissures of the Earth the rest The TABLE CHAP. I. Of Subterraneous Fire-houses That is Abysses or deep Storehouses of Fire or if you will Aestuaries that is places overslown and raging with or as it were Creeks of Fire underground CHAP. II. Of the Volcano's or Ignovomous that is Fire-vomiting Mountains in General CHAP. III. Of the Manifold Volcano's of Italy in Particular CHAP. IV. Of the Remakables of Volcano's and their Eruptions in General CHAP. V. Of the Remarkables of the Volcano's of Italy and their notorious Eruptions in particular c. Viz. Of the Phlegraean Plains or Volcano's Court. Of the Mountain Vesuvius c. CHAP. VI. Of the Prodigious and Wonderful Aetna in Special and of the Vulcanian Islands adjoyning Aetna's Crater or Fire-Cup A Chronicle of Aetna's Fires c. Of the Volcanello's Strombolo and Volcano c. A sad story of a Spanish Priest c. A foolish Story of Sir Thomas Gresham The VULCANO'S OR Mountains vomiting Fire famous in the World with their Remarkables CHAP. I. Of Subterraneous Abysses and Conservatories or Store-houses of Fire the Original Cause and Sourse of all fiery Eruptions and Vulcano's THAT there are Subterraneous Conservatories and Treasuries of Fire even as well as there are of Water and Air c. and vast Abysses and bottomless Gulphs in the Bowels and very Entrals of the Earth stored therewith no sober Philosopher can deny If he do but consider the prodigious Vulcano's or fire-belching Mountains the eruptions of sulphurous fires not only out of the Earth but also out of the very Sea the multitude and variety of hot Baths every where occurring And that they have their sourse and birth-place not in the Air not in the Water nay nor as the Vulgar perswade themselves not at the bottom of the Mountains but in the very in-most privy-Chambers and retiring places of the Earth is as reasonable to think And there Vulcan as it were to have his Elaboratories Shops and Forges in the profoundest Bowels of Nature For how else could there be every where such a quantity of Minerals brimstone and sulphurous unctuous matters without any fire and subterraneous burnings of fire-engendring and all concocting nature which by no means can be conceived to be enkindled from the conflicts of air and moisture in those most dark and deep Regions of the Earth so remote from all influence of the Sun Therefore subterraneous fire was necessary to the internal Oeconomy or constitution of as it were the organiz'd parts of the earth and distribution of Life and heat as we may so say to all the exteriour members Plato acknowledges hidden treasuries of ever-flowing flames and most huge Rivers of fires as well as of waters Yea and Aristotle himself affirms most ample sourses as of water so of spirit and fire Also Pliny Vitruvius Cicero have noted this Arcanum of nature for in the bowels of the earth are observed hidden operations of heat and the greatest parts of the world are upheld and sustained by heat underneath We see fire struck forth from the conflict and attrition of stones and the reeking earth to smoke upon every new digging especially if deep And also hot and warm waters drawn out of Wells continually and that chiefly in winter for that a great force of heat is contain'd and pent up within the Caverns of the earth All the Poetick Fables of Vulcan Vesta the Cyclops seem to allude to this subterraneous fire This is the sense of Lucretius singing thus The Earth contains within it's Womb First Seeds whence th' Sea and flowing Rivers come In constant course Sources of Fire it has For burning Soyls we see in many a place But above all Aetna's impetuous Cell Rages with flames from th' lowest pit of Hell And Manilius But with all parts the Fires mingled are Quick Lightning in the teeming Clouds of th' Air They gender Pierce the Earth whence Aetna's Mountains Dare Heaven Also
temper of mixture and the virtue of the heat which it has under a different Tract of Veins produces various effects and causes marvellous burnings and Eruptions at certain times We conclude therefore saith Kircher That Italy the Nurse of Burnings and Combustions as it is all over stuffed with subterraneous fires which burn in some places perpetually in others by fits so heretofore it had so great increases of Sulphur such a coacervation and vast treasury of fires that if it suffered not a total conflagration yet at least to have burnt in a very great part as Berosus witnesses Nor is it less credible according to these principles of nature standing that even again and again it shall burn with vast Conflagrations till the very final Destruction and Consumation of the whole Universe Lastly Those of Aetna in Sicily and Strongylus Vulcano c. of the Lipparitan Islands have no doubt their Submarine and Subterrane Communications with the Italian Vesuvian c. also The Soyl of Sicily springs with often and eternal fires and the whole Island cavernous producing Sulphur and Bitumen abundantly whereby exceeding fertile of old and even to this very day CHAP. IV. Of the Remarkables of Vulcano's and their most prodigious Phaenomena's bitberto observ'd in particular With particular Relations c. THus all the World over are found Eruptions of Fire by Natures own kindling as if she kept House under-ground and made several Hills her ignivomous and evacuating Chimneys In Ocmuzio an Island of the Persian Gulph all things are full of fires whence 't is said to have burnt seven whole years continually It yet belches forth daily out of the Saline Mountains which it abounds with globes of flames whereby the most famous Mart of the whole East is almost quite laid wast In Media Susis at the white Tower breaks forth with fire out of fifteen Chymney-holes with such a vehement noise and sound that the People round about are perswaded the Gates of Hell to be there In Japon above other Islands Vulcan seems to have forg'd a number of his Shops and Work-houses vomiting forth fire and smoak night and day And as it is seventy miles distant from the famous City Firandus so by night they illuminate the whole Region like so many blazing Torches to the admiration of Beholders In the Island Java the Mountain not far from the City Panacura having not burnt for many years for some places burn alwayes some by fits In the year 1586 raged with such a violent Eruption that ten thousand persons are said to have perished in the subjacent fields and three whole dayes darting forth mighty stones into the said City with fumes caused such a darkness as hid the Sun and turned day into night The Mountain Pico in the Island Timor of such an height that a flamy Spire or Pyramid was seen for three hundred miles in the Sea This in the year 1638 had its very foundations shaken by an horrible Earthquake and was wholly swallow'd up together with the Island leaving nothing behind it but an huge mighty Lake So the Annals of the Jesuites Society relate The Mountain Gounapi in one of the Bandan Islands in the year 1586 after continual burnings of seventeen years at length burst asunder sent forth such a quantity of stones cinders ashes and sulphureous-Bituminous Pumice-stones that the Sea almost cover'd therewith all seem'd to burn with the destruction of all Fish and living Creatures In the Island Ternat one of the Malacca's there is an high and steep Mountain climbing up into the Clouds whose lower parts are beset with thick Woods and Forrests and upper parts peel'd and made bare with continual burnings On the very top it hath a Cup or deep Mouth with a vast gaping made round into many circles from greater to lesser like an Amphitheater or stage one below another This at the time of the Aequinoctials chiefly by the blast of the Northern winds raging with smoak and flames reduces all the neighbour places round about overwhelm'd with ashes and cinders into desolation The Maurican Islands seem wholly to burn whence frequent Earthquakes and casts forth out of Caverns and the very top of the Mountain Thola such quantity of flames ashes and stones as big as great Trees that it seems a kind of Hell The Atlantick Sea west of Africa so abounds with subterraneous Fires that Plato's Laud call'd Atlantis seems to have perish'd from no other cause but as swallow'd up with the fierceness of these Fires and the frequency of Earthquakes following thereupon And to this very day certain Tracts of Seas are abundantly infested with shines and fires issuing out of their store-houses whose rage both Columbus and Vespuccius to their great hazard try'd Neer Hesperius a Mountain in Ethiopia the fields in the night all glitter with Light As also a certain piece of ground does the like in Babylonia and some places in Italy were noted before for some such like thing Pliny after reckoning up of the most notorious concludes with the burning of the high and vast Mountain Theonochema or Chariot of the Godds in Africa as the most famous example of this kind above all others at least in those dayes And ends saying In so many places with so many fires does Vniversal Nature burn and roast the Earth And this great Naturalist who perish'd in prying too curiously into these dangerous prodigies of Nature considering how full fraught the World is with this Element and how propagative it is of it self sayes It is the greatest Miracle that an universal Conflagration of the World has not happen'd already Truly it exceeds all Miracles that there has been any day wherein all things have not burnt Those be his words Some of the Vulcano's in the Andes in the Kingdom of Chile were so big-belly'd as it were with fires that in the year 1645 they brought forth so great Calamities to that Kingdom that no Pen is able to express whole Cities every where being both swallow'd up and overturn'd The City Paraquipa ninety Leagues distant from Lima has a neighbouring Vulcanian Mountain continually darting forth fires in so much that the People are sorely afraid lest sometime it should burst asunder and destroy the whole Countrey The Vulcano's of Guatimalla are more terrible In the year 1586 almost all the City of Guatimalla fell with an Earthquake This Vulcano had then for six months together day and night cast from the top and vomited as it were great flouds of Fire As is also observeable of the Vulcano of Quito which cast such aboundance of ashes that in many Leagues compass thereabouts it darkned the light of day In Nicaragua in North America thirty five Leagues from the City Leon an high Mountain vomits forth flames in such abundance as to be seen for ten miles distance and more And another not far from Aquapulcus of the same fierceness Of these Vulcano's some vomit out of their mouths smoke and ashes or both some
supply'd with new and new food alwayes And how the Pumices Cinders and Ashes and the other refuses of burnt matter should in succession of time be converted into new materials fit for fires Which knot that it may be untied You may remember that before elsewhere we shewed how that to the conservation of Nature in its perpetual constant course there was a necessity of an everlasting circulation and return round of things In the Heavens the Elements the Air Water Earth and its several sorts soils and Minerals c. even with the very Fire also and its materials and nutriment As appears in the perpetual wheeling round of the Planets and Stars by a constant and inviolable Law of Nature so many thousands of years The perpetual motion and mutation of the Elements alwayes unvariable in the greatest variety of things The perpetual circulation of waters both within and about the Earth All Rivers come from the Sea and return to the Sea again as Solomon the Wise hath confirm'd to us The Sun dries up the vapours of the Sea the vapours are received into rain and return back to the Earth and Sea again Elegantly expressed by Ovid The Earth resolv'd is turned into streams Water to Air the purer Air to slames From whence they back return The fiery flakes Are turn'd to Air The Air thickned takes The Liquid form of Water That Earth makes Or as Dubartas has it The purest humour in the Sea the Sun Exhales i' th Air which there resolv'd anon Return to Water and descend again By sundry wayes into his Mother Main Many therefore wondring whilst they behold Aetna burning so many thousand years how the Mountain should not be consumed by so long and lasting Burnings Nor the Fire ever extinct But Bursting wide ope its Fornace Mouth still streams With melted stones still spues out Globes of Flames And by a thousand Fires as Virgil exprest it before It spending still the fewel which it burns Yet still to former strength afresh returns These certainly if they understood the circling operations of Nature would not so strangely admire when as food is never at any time wanting thereto to perpetuate the Burnings The Fires burn the Mountain and convert the Miscellany or mixture of combustible matter into Ashes Out of the Ashes mixt with Water a new food and nourishment of everlasting Fire is generated Omnia continuo rapidos virtuntur in orbes Naturâ motus perpetuante suos Which may be englished out of our Incomparable Cowly altering a word from his extravagant allusion to drinking Nothing in Nature's constant found But an Eternal course goes round This premised I take for granted First That a great plenty of Salt lies hid in the Ashes which even from hence is proved That Salt is no wayes more easily got than from a Lixive or Lee of things reduced into Ashes By this means Nitre Salt Allom in some more moist places breaking or springing out of the walls and sides as also in the dunging-places of Pidgeons and other Animals first vegitated and quickned with Urine is dug forth in most plentiful store and abundance I suppose for granted Secondly That out of the humid Sea tinctured and seasoned with a fat saltishness and mixture of other Mineral things an huge quantity of Exhalations together with the spirits and insensible corpuseles of the said things are extracted by vertue of the Sun Which being both extrinsecally resolved into Rain Hail Snows settle about the top of the highest Mountains and also intrinsecally deriv'd through subterraneous passages of the Sea do fertilize the matter of the Fire-houses under ground with new provant These things supposed I say That the Fire perpetually powerful and waxing strong in its Store-houses is also by occult fibres and veins of the Sea insinuating and entering underneath perpetually augmented whilst that it replenishes and recruits the matter consum'd away with fire as are the Ashes and the most porous stones of Pumices with a Sulphureous Soot and Bituminous Spirits And in some measure prepares and disposes it for an enkindling and inflamation But when by the melting of the Hail and Snow both with the fervent heat of the Sun and also with the heat of so near Fire lurking within and by the coming on of Rain the Dust and Ashes be soaked through with a most plentiful bewetting From hence a certain mixt matter is propagated which insinuated more deeply within the porous recesles and spaces of the Pumice-stones And then Sulphureous and Bituminous Spirits which but now lately lodged there intervening to their help at length ends presently as soon as it is waxen ripe in a new food and nourishment of the Fire And that this is so I found by an irrefragable experiment in the brinks and edges of the Valleys of Aetna Vesuvius and Strongylus burnt up with Fire in most of the Cindry and Ashy walls and sides of which I found an immense quantity of Salt Allom and Niere springing forth In some also a slowing and gushing forth of Bitumen Napththe and the like fat oily liquors together her with a most copious quantity of Sulphur Which have their original from no where else but partly out of the Cinders of combust and burnt things from which must necessarily be begot a new off-spring and succession of Salt and Nitre Partly from the Sulphureous corpuseles or spirits which while they continually exhale from the lowest Gulph of the Mountain are condensed into Sulphur in the more cold climate of the Mountain And so that mixt matter is generated cut of Salt Nitre ' Allom Bitumen ' and Sulphur which insinuated as hath been said into the pores of the Calx or Calcined Lime or Ashes of the burnt and adust Pumice and Stones it administers that perpetual and everlasting fuel and food of Fire which we have hitherto inquired after For this corrupted by the Fire as it prepares new burnings so the fat and sulphureous matter being burnt up which lurk'd and lay dormant within the Pumices undergo some respits or truces as it were Till the capacity of the Pumices and the remaining Calx or Calcined Ashes be replenished again as was said with the like new birth of combustible matter But now what happens in the exteriour and outmost surface of Aetna It 's certain the same is effected in all other slammivomous Mountains Nature carrying it self after the same manner alwayes Yea he that shall more narrowly and throughly dive into these things he cannot be ignorant that the process of Nature which we have expressed in the exteriour surface of the Mountain but that it keeps the same course and tenour or order in its intimate and inmost Fire-houses or Receptacles Corallary II. Hence it follows That the food and fuel of Subterraneous Fire follows the Motion of the Sea raging with a perpetual reciprocation of Flux and Reflux For from the concitation and commotion of the Tide The Sea being thrust through occult passages and Burrows at its bottom as
a youth in the days of King Henry That it was then generally bruited throughout England That Mr. Gresham a Merchant setting sail from Palermo in Sicily where there then dwelt one Antonio called The Rich who at one time had two Kingdoms morgaged unto him by the King of Spain being crossed by contrary winds was constrained to anchor under the Lee of this Island Strombolo Now about mid day when for certain hours it accustomedly forbears to flame he ascended the Mountain with eight of the Sailers and approaching as near the vent as they durst among other Noises they heard a Voice cry aloud Dispatch Dispatch The Rich Antonio is a coming Terrified herewith they descended and anon the Mountain again evaporated fire But from so dismal a place they made all the haste that they could when the wind still thwarting their Course and desiring much to know more of this matter they returned to Palermo and forthwith enquiring of Antonio It was told them that he was dead and computing the time did find it to agree with the very Instant that the Voice was heard by them Gresham reported this at his return to the King and the Mariners being called before him confirmed by Oath the Narration In Gresham himself as this Gentleman said for I no otherwise report it it wrought so deep an impression that he gave over all Traffick distributing his Goods part to his Kinsfolkes and the rest to good and publick uses retaining only a competency for himself and so spent the rest of his Life in a solitary devotion A very ill contrived Story attended with no probable circumstances T is like indeed it might be generally bruited as the Gentleman says among the Vulgar by some that would have had it so but never could obtain general credit among the wiser at least and more knowing much less ever to be recorded because so easily consutable ERRATA Candid Reader IF thou wouldst make true sense of what thou readest thou must needs first correct at least these grosser Errata's which quite and clean pervert it Page 5. line 11. For Stagnete reade Stagnate P. 7. l. 7. Blot out Canary Islands And add to that Section of that Chapter thus much further Historians of these times write also That even Teneriff in the Canary Islands now and then smokes out of the top of its crown and to have sometimes heretofore burnt and vomited I lames The Sulphureous Stones testifie which in great plenty are brought into Spain It abounds also with hot Ba hs and Bituminous l ountains which are manifest tokens of Subrerraneous Fires in those AtlanticklSeas lurking underneath Pag. 8. l. 4. for Vulcano's read Vulcanello's P. 9. l. 1. for Island read Islands P. 10. l. 29. f. Mothern r. Northern P. 23. l. 20. f. Fire Sulphur r. Fir'd Sulphur P. 29. l. 33. f. rarifie r. rarifie P. 32. l. 9. f. Shone 2. shown P. 33. l. 3d from the bottom f. could r. they could P. 36. l. 20 f. discuse r. discusse P. 47 l. 23 and 24. No doubt in stead of 30. and 400 miles it should be 3 and 4 miles though so in our Author P. 48. l. 6 from bottom f Rocks verge r. Rocks verge c. P. 57. l. 3. from bottom f. lies r. lay's P 58. l. 14 from bottom f. Islands r. Island P. 62. l. 14. from bottom f. Memories r. Memoires Besides many lesser faults which are left to thy own discretion in reading From what Signs Subterraneous Fire is gathered The necessity of Subterraneous Fire Fire is no where wanting Vables of Poets allude to Subterraneous Fire The whole Earth is Cavernous The Wedlock of Fire and water within the Earth Subterraneous fire seeks passages for vent The need and use thereof The last general Conflagration of the World Hell in the Center of the Earth according to some The Fire and Waters mutual need and use And need of air and breath as it were Vulcano's are Breathing-Holes of Nature Earthquakes proper Effects of Sub erraneous fire 〈…〉 ano's of 〈◊〉 c. The Vulcanian Mountains of Africa Of America The Vulcan's of Europe Italy abounds with subterraneous fires Of Germany c. Towards the Northern Pole Italy abounds with Subterraneous Fires The Phlegraean Plains All Campania obnoxious to Fires Campagna di Roma springs with Sulphur The swimming Islands of Tivo Burrows of Subterraneous Fire dispersed into various branches Two near Fountains one most hot the other most cold Breathing Orifices of Subterraneous Fire at Petra Mala. Italy heretofore in great part burnt Vnder-ground Commerce of Fires between Italy Sicily c. Of Asia and the Eastern Islands c. Of Africa c. Of America c. Of Europe c. The Wonders of St. Thomas Monastery in Groenland c. An horrible stinking Ditch and Pond A marvellous force of jetting or dartingforth Waters It s height top and bigness The largeness and horrid face of its Crater Paths or tracts of fiery floods or rivers Snow and Ashes co ver its top The new generating of Combustible matter An horendous spectacle of the Aetnean Gulph or Whirlpit A perpetual Eructation of Smoak Sounds and formidable crackling noises Eruptions of Fires in many places An huge Cave or Den. The length breadth of the fiery Torrents The wonderfull works of God In the time of the Janigenae about the year 600. In the time of the Argonauts year 2714. Of Aeneas his Expedition the year 2768 From about 3180 til toward 3600. In the time of the Roman Consuls from about 3440 to â—â—â—â— Of Julius Casar 3900. Of C. Caligula Caesar in the year of Christ 49. About the Martyrdom of St. Agatha In the year 812. In the year 1160 In the year 1284. In the year 1329. 1408 1444 1536. 1554 1633 1650 1669 The formal cause of its burnings The material The instrumental cause The efficient The Mountain ejects Fires according to the Winds What thing that may be which causes so great Ruines of the Mountain
Regions abounds with these vomiting Mountains of fire Persia has divers Vulcano's And in the Island Armuzia The Island Zeilan remarkable by the name of Adam In Persia itself many sulphurous Craters or Cups very terrible to Travellers with Susis in Media and Cophantus in the Region of the Bactrians sormidable to beholders In the Moguls Empire in the Kingdom of Ingoston Tibet Camboi every where these kind of Mountains and in the most vast Kingdom of China But especially the Molucco-and Philippine-Islands and the universal Archipelago of St Lazarus so abounds with these Vulcanian places that there 's scarce an Island without them either in the Crater's or deep mouth'd Cups and hellish ditches if not upon the Mountains themselves Also in the Bandan's whereof the Mountain Gourapi most eminent in both the Java's within the entrails of most high Mountains The Mountain Balalvanus in Sumatra The inaccessible Mountain in the Island Terenate In the Maurician Islands the Mountain Tola In Tandaia nigh the Promontory of the Holy Ghost are found some also as also in the Island Marindica Moreover in Jappan no small number near the City Firandus and a famous one over against the City Tanaxuma in one of the Seven Sisters Islands so called and several other circumjacent Islands every where which through subterraneous Burrows or Channels have occult commerce with St. Lazarus Islands in the Archipelago even to new Guiny and those called Solomon's Islands and from thence to other Islands of the Pacifick commonly call'd the South Sea For in new Guiny as also in the Southern Land are observed such Mountains to the great astonishment of Mariners And the like are seen in the vast Southern Ocean or South Sea In the Indian Ocean every where Desert and Rockey Mountains discover their smoking Chimneys even in the shores of Northren Tartary towards Muscovy are frequent Vulcanello's and in all the Ocean and Islands almost c. which we leave and come to Africa Where Fight famous Vulcano's are observ'd Two in Monomotopa Four in Angola Congus and Guiny One in Lybia and One in Abâ—ssia besides innumerable Craters and sulphurous Dens every where obvious some whereof having consum'd their combustible matter have ceas'd again to re-inkindle when they shall have ripen'd and concocted again their recruited matter and fuel The Atlantick Sea so abounds with subterraneous Fires that Plato's Land call'd Atlantis seems to have been swallow'd up from no other cause but the outrages of these fues and earthquakes thence arising And to this very day some Tracts are every where infested with flames and fires breaking forth from their under-ground store-houses the violence and rage whereof both Columbus and Vespuccius at their great peril had experience of The Terzera's can scarce be inhabited for the vehemency of fires The Canary Islands and in them the Pico or Pike a Mountain of immense Altitude equal to Taenariff belches forth flames to this very day as also the Plains of the circumjacent Islands stuffed with brimstone and sulphurous-unctuous matter The Islands of St. Helen and of the Ascention to have stam'd heretofore both the burnt Rocks of Mountains and the Cinders and plenty of Mineral and Stone-coals burnt and chark'd as it were do sussiciently shew Yet no part of the world more famous than America which you may call Vulcan's Kingdom In the Andes alone which they call the Cordillera from a Coneatenation of Mountains in the Kingdom of Chile are fifteen Vulcano's To these you may adjoyn the Vulcano's out of the Southern part of the Magellanick Sea commonly call'd Terra del Fuego In Peru not fewer then in Chile six of inaccessible height and three in the continued tops of the Andes besides innumerable Vulcanian Ditches Pits and Jakes In Carappa a Province of Popayan is a Mountain raging with smoke and flames chiefly in serene weather The City Paraquipa ninety leagues distant from Lima has a Mountain near it casting forth continually such sulphurous fires that the People are greatly afraid lest sometime at length the Eruptions should utterly destroy the whole Region At the valley of Peru call'd Mulahallo fifteen leagues distant from the City Quito is another Vulcan continually belching sorth flames far and near and threatning the People In the Northern America are observed five partly in new Spain viz. Three formidable for their belching flames partly in new Granada partly in the very heart and midst of Califormia and the more in-land Mexican Kingdom In Nicaragua one Another neer Aquapulcus three neer the Continent of Califormia And in the American Mediterranean Sea two others and innumerable others 't is like not yet discover'd through all the Terr-aqueous Globe In Europe five chief ones are noted viz. Aetna in Scicily by the Monuments of all Writers whether Poets or Historians most famous Strongylus and some other of the Liparitan Islands not very remote from Scicily especially that notorious by the name of Vulcano to which is adjoyn'd another call'd Vulcanello said all to have burnt heretofore call'd the Vulcano's or Vulcanian Islands The Mountain Hecla in Izland in the surthest North and Chimaera in Greece besides many others in each particular Country at least Fire-wells Pits and Orifices c. Among all which Italy throughout all Ages is the most notorious for such underground Harths and Aestuaries of which more particularly by its self And indeed Italy is most fitly seated of all Countries of Europe for such vast Combustions and Eruptions of fire Neither are Germany France Spain and other Countries wholly distitute of theirs where though there be none answerable to the other yet both the frequent sulphureous Craters and deep burning Ditches and Pits vomitting forth smoke and flames and also the innumerable multiude of hot Baths and Wells every where do betray some store and work-houses of subterraneous fire creeping between their Conservatories and Abysses of water In Misnia in Germany the Mountain Carbo ever and anon rages with sume and fire c. Neither are the furthest Tracts of the North too cold and frozen for them Four whereof Authors reckon in the Region of the Tynsei in Tartary In Lapland high Mountains are observ'd to belch forth flames like Aetna In Izland the famous Hecla And lest Nature might seem to have lest the furthest Regions of the North curs'd with the Everlasting inclemency of Cold and Ice it has constituted an huge Vulcanian Mountain in the Island call'd Groenland next to the Pole And others in the Neighbouring whether Islands or Continents scituated about the Pole which they continue even unto the Creeks and Bayes of the Southern Land call'd Del Fuego So that many think that the Tracts of the Northern Pole inaccessible by reason of the multitude of these fire-spewing Mountains CHAP. III. Of the Vulcano's of Italy Scicily and Neighbouring Islands ITaly and the adjacent Island have in all times afforded prodigious Heats Combustions Aestuaries hot Baths Conflagrations and Eruptions of burning flames and
fires and there are some which never cast either smoke flames or ashes but in the bottom are seen to burn with a quick fire never dying This impos'd upon a greedy Priest and made him think it was nothing else but heaps of Gold melted in the fire which he thought to have fetch'd up by letting down an Iron Kettle with Chains But his device was not fire-proof his Kettle and Chain melting so soon as they approach'd neer the bottom But the greatest wonder of all is that some of these Vulcano's have for some hundreds nay for some thousands of years cast out continually smoke fire and ashes For the European to begin with the more Northern And here first who knows not the notorious Mountain Hecla and also Hegla and of the Holy Cross in Izland by the Relation of all Geographers most remarkable for mighty burnings Mountains so terrible for Thunder flamings out of fire casting abroad stones ashes stink and smoke that the more fanciful conceit that Hell is begun there aforehand which were more plausible if the Apparitions that are seen there were as true as they are said to be frequent And which seems a Miracle of Nature its highest Top or Pike is white with perpetual Snow and its Roots and sides blazing with unquenchable burnings And the multitude of hidden Gulphs and Whirl-pits suffer none to come neer for many furlongs And by the Eructuation of stones and ashes reduces all the circumjacent Plain into barrenness together with a formidable noise and crackling Which while the Inhabitants hear they superstitiously believe the Souls of the wicked to be tormented there with a miserable howling And even in Groenland perpetually frozen with extreamest cold next to the very North Pole there is an huge Vulcanian Mountain at whose Roots is a Monastery of the Order of Preachers call'd St. Thomas's built of Tophas-stone from the casting out of the Mountains Concerning which Bartholomew Zenet a Venetian a diligent Inspector and searcher into these things I know not by what accident cast on these Coasts relates many wonderful things Here sayes he is seen St. Thomas's Monastery of the Dominicans And not far distant an Ignivomous Mountain at the foot whereof a fiery Eountain breaks forth With the Water of this Fountain derived by Pipes not only all the Cells of the Moncks are made hot like Stoves but also their Meat dressed yea and their very Bread bak'd The Mountain vonsits forth the Tophaz or Pumice-stone which the whole Monstery is built of For those Tophaz's soaked through with that hot Water are cemented together as it were with clammy Bitumen Here are also most pleasant Gardens watered with boyling Water in which are Flowers and Fruits of all kinds And this Water when it hath run through the Gardens falls into a neighbour Gulph or Port whereby it happens that it never is frozen and therefore the Fish and innumerable Birds and Fowl frequent there wherewith the Inhabitants live in full plenty So he writes who saw and discovered the Coast the King of Danes chief Admiral Nicholas Zenet a Venetian Now it is most likely that the Vulcan's of Izland and Groenland have communication together by hidden Burrows and Channels and are perpetually imploy'd by secret Aestuaries to allay the vehemency of the Cold and abundance of Ice Whence also is drawn the Reason why in some Northern Islands and the Shores of Norway Finmark Biarmia Lapland in one part the Sea is easily frozen with Ice in another part not at all by no force of cold or snows Also in some shores most abundant Pastures together with Trees and most fruitful fields are found In others as in Nova Zemblia neither Grass nor Trees nor any thing profitable for the nutriment of Man to be met with There was also some Vulcanian Hill Crater or Pit which burnt for sixteen years in Scotland and consum'd a large quantity of ground Even as now some Coal-Mines about Newcastle are said to have continued burning for several years of late and 't is likely do so still In Germany was violent Eruptions formerly Who in these latter Ages hath ever heard or read of such a Fire issuing out of the Earth as Tacitus describes which burnt a whole Territory against which Water was unavaileable which could never be extinguish'd but with Stones Cloaths Linnen and Wollen and other dry Materials cast thereon Tacitus words run thus The City of the Inhonians in Germany confederate with us saith he was afflicted with a sudden disaster For fires issuing out of the Earth burned Towns Fields Villages every where and spread even to the Walls of a Colony newly built and could not be extinguished neither by Rain nor River-water nor any other liquor that could be employed until for want of remedy and anger of such a distraction certain Peasants cast stones afar off into it then the slame somewhat slacking drawing near they put it out with blows of Clubs and otherwise as if it had been a wild beast Last of all they threw in cloaths from their backs which the more worn and fouler the better they quenched the fires We have omitted the high Mountains in Lapland also which Olaus relates belch forth hideous slames like Aetna's In Greece the Mountain Nymphaeus stings out fire also and pitchy bituminous matter the fury whereof is enkindled by rain and water As also the fire of those Ignivomous Mountains of Lycia and Pamphylia in Asia minor not mentioned before viz. The monstrous Mountain Chimaera heretofore famous for often belching forth Fires It 's Fire is the more inkindled with Water but quenched with Earth or Hay As also the Hephaestian Mountains near Chimaera whose Earth touched with a lighted Torch or Brand suddenly takes fire so that the stones burn in the very waters and the fire is fed and nourished by Rains and Waters And if with a kindled or burning brand furrows be made in the Earth Streams or Rivers as it were of Fire will run along after As Pliny writes In the Mediterranean in the Archipelago the Island Santorin has had formidable Fires and Earthquakes as in the year 1650 from the relation of Fa. Fr. Riccard of the Jesuits society who was present and an eye witness and with his own mouth related the whole event to Kircher at Rome afterwards and by the following Testimony would have it known to posterity The Relation of Fa. Fr. Riccard concerning Subterraneous Fires which brake forth from the bottom of the Sea in the year 1650. near the Island Santorin in the Archipelago ALthough some reprove Pliny of lyes in that he relates certain stupendous things above humane capacity yet daily experience teaches us that in many things he spake true chiesly in the History of many Islands which in succession as time arose and started up from the bottom of the Sea and amongst others Thera in the 135. Olympiad which was about the year of the world 3200. It was also call'd Calista and Phylothera But now Santorin
those also is the retiring of the Sea to be attributed who strugling to break forth do ratifie and so raise the Earth which thereby also as it were made thirsty sucks the water through crannies into her spungy and hot intrails increasing the vapours not decreasing the fire by reason of the Bitumen Perhaps Delos and Rhodes unseen in the first Ages were made apparant by such means however divers of the Vulcanello's or Liperitan Islands were without peradventure All of them having slam'd and being now more in number than observed by the Ancients This new Mountain when newly raised had a number of issues at some of them smoking and sometimes flaming at others disgorging rivolets of hot waters keeping within a terrible rumbling and many miserably perished that ventured to descend into the hollowness above But that hollow on the top is at this present an Orchard And the Mountain thorow-out is bereft of his terrors Of Vesuvius a Vulcanian Mountain in the Kingdom of Naples likewise now called Monte di Somma The most noted Vulcano of the Mountain Vesuvius is also in this happy Country of Campania a little further remov'd from Naples whose ragings and eruptions have been wonderfully remarkable in all Ages And yet notwithstanding all its fires and burnings its Hills are full of Vines and Olives and all its Fields about of wonderful fruitfulness save only the Top alone where it hath a great Plain bare and bearing no manner of fruit at all The face of the Earth like Cinders or Ashes and old ruinated and wasted Rocks undoubted signs of its ancient and often Burnings Vesuvius then is a Mountain of Campania Foelix about eight miles from Naples which also hath received great injuries and prejadices by its Cinders and violent burling forth of Stones flung even to its Walls and Edifices This Mountain has vast Fountains of Fire And heretofore was on every side high before the inward parts were consumed with fires It utters usually smoak by day but by night flames It s manner is to send forth a loud sound or roaring noise and bellowing first and then to belch forth an huge force of Cinders with the manifest danger of passers by But if a more vehement Wind ply upon it the Ashes or Cinders are rais'd so high and drove so far in length that 't is certain they have sometimes been carried as Procopius testifies even as far as Constantinople it self and All at length so affrighted that they ran to their prayers for many years to avert the wrath of God Thus Coel. Rhodigin Mr. Sand's Relation runs thus This Mountain hath a double top that towards the North doth end in a plain the other towards the South aspireth more high which when hid in clouds prognosticates rain to the Neopolitans In the top there is a large deep hollow without danger to be descended into in form of an Amphitheatre in the midst a pit which leads into the entrails of the Earth from whence the Mountain in times past did breath sorth terrible flames the mouth whereof is almost choaked with broken Rocks and Trees that are fallen therein Next to this the matter thrown up is ruddy light and soft more removed black and ponderous the uttermost brow that declineth like the seats in a Theater flourishing with Trees and excellent Pastorage The midst of the Hill is shaded with Chesnut-trees and others bearing sundry fruits The lower parts admirably cloathed with Veins that afford the best Greek-Wines of the World which hath given to the Mountain the name of Di Sommo in regard of their excellency affording to the Owners the yearly revenue of three hundred thousand Duckats So now it hath lost the name of Vesuvius with the cause why it was given which signifieth a Spark as Veseus a Conflagration But never any thing appear'd so horrible as that which happened in the first or third years Reign of the Emperour Titus eighty years after Christ. For then it disgorg'd such boyling waves and slouds of Fire as consum'd the neighbouring Cities And then also it was that Pliny the second that great searcher of Nature and famous Author of the Natural History and then Admiral of the Roman Navy desirous to discover the Reason was suffocated in his too near approaches and research after so great a Mystery of Nature As witnesseth his Nephew in an Epistle to Cornel. Tacitus Not indeed wilfully and on set purpose as 't is said but I think falsly of the other grand Philosopher that he threw himself into the contrary Element because he could not understand the strange Mystery thereof At that time not only issued forth such store of Smoak that the very Sun seem'd to be in the Eclipse but also huge Stones and of Ashes such plenty that Rome Africk and Syria were even covered And besides Beasts Fish and Fowl it overwhelmed with Pumice-stones two adjoyning Cities Herculanum and Pompeios with the people sitting in the Theater There were heard dismal noises all about the Province and Giants of incredible bigness seen to stalk up and down the top and edges of the Mountain or rather in peoples extravagant fancies which extraordinary Accident was adjudged either a cause or presage of the future Pestilence which raged in Rome and Italy long after Hieronymus Borgius touching the horrible roarings and thundrings of this Mountain thus sets it forth in sutable Verse Then remote Africk suffer'd the dire heat Of twofold Rage with showrs of Dust repleat Scorcht Egypt Memphis Nilus felt amaz'd The woful Tempest in Campania rais'd Not Asia Syria nor the Towers that stand In Neptune's surges Cyprus Creet Joves Land The scatter'd Cyclads nor the Muses seat Minerva's Town that vast Plague scap'd Such 〈◊〉 Such vapours break forth from full jaws then shone When Earth-born horrible Orimedon Hot vomits ire beneath Vesuvius thrown Dion affirms in a manner as much But Bodin the censurer of all Historians doth deride it Notwithstanding Cassiodorus writes as great matters of a later Conflagration whereupon Theodoricus first King of the Goths in Italy did remit his Tribute to the damnisied Campanians Marcellinus further observes that the Ashes thereof transported in the Air obscured all Europe and that the Constantinopolitans being wonderfully affrighted therewith insomuch as the Emperor Leo forsook the City in memorial of the same did yearly celebrate the 12 th of November It also burnt in the sixth year of Constantine the fourth which was about the year of Christ 640 and at such times as Bellisarius took Naples which was about the year 540 and groaned but elected no Cinders and again when the Saracens invaded Africa sometime after c. Plautina writes that it flamed in the year 685 prognosticating the death of Pope Benedict the second with ensuing slaughters rapines and deaths of Princes During the Papacy of two other Benedicts the 8th and the 9th it is said to have done the like The later the last flaming thereof which was in the year 1024 yet often
Earth shall be drown'd with the Ire of thy Fury and the Elements melt with fervent heat Morning therefore waxing light that I might search out the Constitution of the whole Interiours of the Mountain with all the diligence I could I chose a safe and secure place to set my feet sure upon which was an huge Rock of a plain surface to which there lay open an Avenue by a descent of the Mountain very far And so I went down unto it Here taking sorth my Pantometer or universal Measurer I set upon the dimensions of the Mountain and found by a Geometrical Computation the compass of the Crater to contain almost three hundred paces but the depth eight hundred The Mountain all up and down every-where cragged and broken No gradual declining for any passage to the inward parts but descended in its compass or circuit after the manner of a Cylinder made hollow directly and streight And although the Bottom seemed to the eye to be contained in a more narrow circumference yet according to Optick Accounts and Laws That happened from the exceeding great distance and prosundity from the innermost surface of the Crater or mouth In the Center of the Bottom Nature seem'd to have constituted as it were her Harth of Fire And to say truth a Shop or Workhouse to make a Vulcanian Kitchin boyling with an everlasting gushing forth and streamings of Smoak and slames and imploy'd in decocting of Sulphur Bitumen and melting and burning other kinds of Minerals and by a certain secret endeavour and enterprise preparing for deadly ruines and slaughters afterwards to be committed Sith the vapours included within as they know not how to be contained so they did discuse or scatter the burden that lay upon them with so great force and violence accompanied with horrible cracklings and noises that the Mountain seem'd to be tost with an Earthquake or trembling Which whensoever it happened the supream and softer parts of the Mountain which clung together of Ashes Cinders Rains and other Refuses of Minerals being shook in pieces and loosened by the trembling and so falling like Hills into the bottom of the Hellish Gulph did from that various reslexion of the sound stir up that crackling noise So great and fearful a one as that any even of the stoutest and most undaunted heart would scarce venture to suffer The matter which was continually belched forth from the center of the Mountain made as it were a new Mountain indued with wonderful variety of furrows or hollow channels which the various ebullition of the melted Minerals flowing into all parts of the circumference of a greenish colour now from Brass presently of a yellow colour from Sulphur Arsenick and Sandarack Now red from Cinnabar Minium or Red Lead and Vermilion then black from Vicriol mixt with Water or of an Ashy colour from the very Cinders did as it were by the ingonious Pencil of Nature form This little Mountain after the last burning of the Mountain which happened in the year 1631 at which time proceeded great Earthquakes as well as Noises and Roarings and Tremblings as is its custom hath grown so big that we may thence very reasonably conjecture that it is hereafter likely to rise unto the same height which it once obtained of old unless it be destroyed by some new burning supervening Which hath happened in this very same year I now write these things in the year 1660. For that the Mountain outragious with a new and horrible burning hath so cast down its top and Crator that it appears now much lower at this day then what I a little before described it to be And consequently as it is found of greater circumference so of lesser profundity Having taken a view of all these things duly and returning to Naples the next day I betook my self into the Island Aenaria which they call Ischia of much note and celebrated with great fame by ancient writers And thence into the Phlegraean Plain of Putzol Fields Vulcan's Market-place or Theater of which before And whatsoever either the Antients or Moderns have related wonderfull of those places I found to be most true It is also taken notice of in History that there was an Eruption and great Burning near Carignole in Terra di Lavoro which laid three Acres of Ground all in meer Ashes and Cinders Tuscany also hath a burning Mountain in the Apennine and another in the Fields of Bononia There are also Laky Ditches Pits and Dens between Pistorium and Petra Mala belching forth perpetual Globes of Flames especially by night There are noted also in the Fields of Mutina two famous places full of Burnings c. But these with the rest of Italy have been barely enumerated before of which we have nothing further remarkable to add And so we are at last come to the main Fountain and Spring-head in a manner as we may say of all the subterraneous Fire of these Parts with their manifold desolating Eruptions Aetna now Monti Gibello CHAP. VI. Of the Remarkables of the grand Volcano Aetna in especial and it s most remarkable Eruptions together with the Vulcanian Islands adjoyning NOtwithstanding the horrid face of things by reason of the frequent prodigious and mischievous Eruptions and Devastations of Aetna Notwithstanding it continually sendeth forth dreadful flames of Fire to the astonishment of all Beholders and that its Soyl springs abundantly with often and eternal Burnings Yet those subterraneous fountains of Fire that continually feed and supply these Vulcano's and the abundance of fat oily sulphureous and inflammable matter and fuel or nourishment wherewith the whole Country thereabouts and all the Island over is so richly stor'd and manur'd with by Natures own bountiful hand every-where plentiously producing Sulphur Bitumen and other rich and fat Earths and Marles c. make Sicily one of the most fertile Islands in the World For the Soyl is incredibly fruitful in the best Wine in Oyl Hony Saffron Minerals also of Gold Silver and Allom together with plenty of Salt and Sugar There are also Gems of Agats and Emeralds Quarries of Porphyre and Serpentine It yieldeth also great store of the richest Silks which grow plentifully about Messina the chief City Variety of most excellent and delicious fruits both for taste and colour with such abundance of all sorts of Grain that it was called in old times Horreum Romani Populi or the Granary of the Roman Empire whence also Cicero call'd it The City of Romes Soul and doth now furnish some parts of Italy Spain and Barbary besides Malta and the adjacent Isles with that which she can spare of her superfluities Nay Tully doth not only call it the Granary and Storehouse of the City of Rome in regard of Corn bat adds that it was accounted for a well-furnish'd Treasury as being able of it self without charge of the State to cloath maintain and furnish the greatest Army with Leather Corn and Apparel And if Diodorus Siculus may be credited in it he tells
about it like a great long Cloud and often hurling forth Stones and Cinders Wherefore the story of Empedocles the Sicilian Philosopher's throwing himself down head-long thereinto is by some call'd into question For it is impossible to be approach'd by reason of the violent Wind the suffocating Smoak and the consuming Fervour yet he might approach too near and perish This Mountain hath flamed in times past so abundantly That by reason of the smoke the Air involv'd with burning Sands and thick Vapours The Inhabitants hereabout could not see one another if we may give credit to Cicero for two dayes together The extraordinary eruption thereof hath been and is to this day reputed ominous For so the most famous Conflagrations in former times hapned hard before the Servile War in Sicily which was not pacisi'd and ended but by the slaughter of three score and ten thousand of the Slaves who had taken up Arms against Rome by the Praetors at which time it raged so violently that Africa was thereof an astonish'd Witness This was about the Year of the World 3900. not long before Christ. And so shortly after the death of Julius Caesar when not only the Cities thereabout were damnified thereby but divers in Calabria also and portended those Proscriptions and bloody Wars which did after follow But these great Eruptions of Fire are not now so ordinary as they have been formerly The matter which gave Fewel to it being wasted by continual Burnings So that the flames which issue hence are hardly visible but by night though the smoke shew it self the most part of the day Yet even at this day once in three or four years it falleth in great flakes on the Countrey below and Vales adjoyning to the terror of the Inhabitants the destruction of their Vintage and great loss of the Countrey But that they say is recompensed by the plenty of the following Years The Ashes thereof according to Strabo so batling and enriching of the Soyl that both the Vines and Corn-fields are much bettered by it and prosper above admiration For indeed we find by experience that Turf of the Ground burnt to Ashes and so spread on Land and ploughed into it doth yeeld a very great improvement even to barren Soyls Howbeit at this day much Ground about it lies wast by means of the ejected Pumice Besides the Countrey hereabouts is daily forraged by Thieves who lurk in a Wood of eight miles compass that neighbours upon Catania But Virgil's admirable Description may serve for all Aetna here thunders with an horrid noise Sometimes black Clouds evapoureth to Skies Fuming with pitchy curls and sparkling Fires Tosseth up Globes of flames To Stars aspires Now belching Rocks The Mountain's Entrals torn And groaning hurls out liquid Stones thence born Through th' Air in showres and from its bottom gloes Like boyling Fornace The reason of these Fires is the abundance of Sulphur and Brimstone contained in the Bosom of the Hâ—ll inkindled by Subterraneous Heats Spirits and Fires with the free ventilation of the Sulphurous and easily inflamable Air and agitating Winds through these open Vulcanian Vents and Funnels with innumerable Chinks Trunks Pipes and Caverns with other conveyances through the Earth c. Also through the Chinks and Chaps of the Earth there is continual more fewel added to the Fire the very Water adding to the force of it As we see the Water cast on Coals in the Smiths Forge doth make them burn more ardently And besides prepares the matter with due moisture to be fit Fuel for new Fires c. And Sicily is an Island all over Cavernous and Fistulous and pervious to the penetrating Winds and under-ground Fires and inflamable Spirits and within abounding with Sulphur Bitumen and other fit Fuel and Materials c. And so is most convenient both for inward Combustions and outward Ventilations and thereby for the extreamest Inflamations and Burnings But the Original Sourse and Fountain or first and principal cause of all these are by some later accounted to be the Subterraneous Abysses and Storehouses of Fire and Heat which Nature has provided and furnished her self with under ground in her inward parts for the necessary uses and occasions of her exteriour c. As was at the beginning observ'd The reason of this flame is thus set down by Ovid. A Rozen Mould these fiery flames begin And Clayte Brimstone aids that Fire within Yet when the slimy Soyl consumed shall Yeeld no more food to feed the Fire withal And Nature shall restrain her nourishment The flame shall cease hating all famishment But more fully by Lucretius Hollow the Mountain is throughout alone Supported well-nigh with huge Caves of Stone No Cave but is with Wind and Air repleat For agitated Air doth Wind beget Which heats th' imprisoning Rocks when hot it grows The Earth chaft by his fury and from those Strikes forth fire and swift flame It self on high It mounts and out at upright Jaws doth flie And Fire sheds far off far off dead Coals Transports and fumes in misty darkness rowls Ejecting Stones withal of wondrous size All which from strength of strugling Winds arise Besides against the Mountains Roots the Main Breaks her swoln Waves and swallows them again From whence unto the Summit of th' Ascent The undermining Caves have their extent Through which the Billows breath and flames out-thrust With forced Stones and dark'ning showrs of dust Besides as was said before Aetna is full of Sulphur and Bitumen apt to be kindled And so is all Sicily the principal Reason that it is so fertile But after all this we will give you Kircher's later and more particular Relation and Description both of it and its Causes and of its most noted Eruptions c. A Description of Aetna by Kircher Wherein as in a certain Prototype the Reasons of Subterraneous Fires and their never failing food are demonstrated as we use to say to the Eye When I survey'd Sicily in the year 1638. before all things I thought fit to examine the Mountain Aetna most of all celebrated by the Monuments of all Writers A great Prototype I say of all burning Grounds and that the most famous type of almost whatsoever kind of ragings by Sea or Land outragious And with this one onely spectacle of Nature alone Sicily is and ever was admirable Seeing you can scarce find an Author either of the Antients or Moderns whom the violence of its ferocious nature hath not drawn into admiration and astonishment Yet because they have only beheld afar off the genuine Causes of so great effects We coming a little nearer to the matter from those things which in these last times have been oberved with my own eyes intending to prosecute its Nature and Constitution we will endeavour to demonstrate opportunely the cause of so strange and exotick effects Aetna therefore is one onely Mountain rearing up on high its Top or Spire unto thirty miles according to the Axis or direct line through the
from Thunder and Lightnings not from any other efficient but from the very subterraneous fire it self making its way unto them through hidden passages of the Rocks which it burns Or if they be not immediately touched by actual Fire then certainly from the Marine waves and billows intruded by the force and impetuousness of the Winds through the Submarine gutters and chinks at the bottom of the Sea For that it cannot be that from the vehement dashing of the billows in strait and narrow places and the agitation of the spirits of combustible matter thereby and the attrition or striking of the sat and Sulphureous Air that they should not presently conceive Fire Of the Liparitan or Vulcanian Islands adjoyning commonly called the Vulcanello's West of Sicily in the Tuscan Sea but South and within sight of Messina an hundred and fifty miles distant from Aetna are the Aeolian Islands so called from Aeolus King thereof He taught at first the use of the Sail and by observing the Fire and Smoak that ascended from these Islands for heretofore they all of them slamed prognosticated of Storms to come And thence the occasion of the Fable of Aeolus's being Godd and King of the Winds for us admirable skill and invention that way Of these anciently there were Seven only But now are Eleven 't is like made since out of the excessive burnings of the other as 't is said of the little one called Vulcanello almost of an equal magnitude Yet Liparis is the greatest being ten miles in circuit as also the most famous to which the others were subject And hence they are now call'd the Liparitan and Vulcanian Islands or Vulcanello's Its fruitful and abounding with Bitumen Sulphur and Alumne having hot Baths much frequented by the diseased The Fire here went out about an Age agoe having as is to be supposed consumed the matter that fed it But at this day Strombolo only burns and that with ragings not inferior to the Aetnaean or Vesuvian Yet Volcano smokes continually from Subterraneous Fires They are said heretofore to have burnt wholly together with the Mountains and Sea as Strabo witnesses Volcano formerly call'd Hiera is a little Island burning in the midst of the Sea where Antiquity placed Vulcans Shop or Forge Because of the Fires seen by night and abundance of smoak by day And therefore received its name from its nature consecrated formerly to Vulcan and called his Mansion It is said but first to have appeared above water about the time that Scipio Africanus dyed A barren Island stony and uninhabited It had three Tunnels wherewith it evaporated Fire But now hath but one out of which it smoaketh continually and casts out stones with an horrible roaring It was heretofore all on Fire and the Sea round about for some dayes together which Pliny reports as a known truth and an instance neer at hand And has not ceased to be on a flame since as it were a Mountain of flames only in the midst of the Sea For even in the year of our Lord 1444 on the 5th of February it flamed so abundantly and flung forth fire and stones with such an hideous noise that not only the rest of the Islands but also Sicily trembled thereat Perhaps the last blaze For now flame it doth not but retaineth the rest of its terrours But now Strombolo is the most notorious at this day Here the Inhabitants formerly were wont from the Smoak to predict what Winds would blow Where Aeolus also the first so skilled therein was King c. as before It was formerly call'd Strongyle corrupted at last into Stromboli from the rotundity thereof For it seem no other than an high round Mountain in the Sea out of the top whereof issueth continnally a flame like a burning Beacon and exceeding clearly so that by night especially it is to be discern'd a wonderful way A place so full of horrour to the Neighbouring-Islanders And yet in those parts where the Rage of the Fire offendeth not it is of a very fruitfull Soyl and apt for Tillage and many others of the Ignoranter Romish Catholicks conceive it and such like places to be the Jaws of Hell it self and that within the damned Souls are tormented To which purpose the good Catholicks who are excellent at pious frauds and tales have or rather have rais'd a pretty Story of Sir Thomas Gresham London's most glorious Benefactor which we shall by and by transcribe out of Mr. Sandys's Travels verbatim True it is he was full of pious and charitable good works and bublick Benefactures in his latter dayes But upon such an occasion as this Story pretends we have not the least reason to believe For surely all our Histories and Memories could never have been wholly silent thereof and of a thing so publickly attested before the King c. But to return to the business again Kircher in the said often mentioned year 1638 thought good also to examine among others of these Islands those two chief ones Volcano and Stromboli And Stromboli indeed for the fierceness and outrages of its Fires which it continually vomited was guarded from all access But Volcano making Truces and Intervals with the Aestuaries discover'd nothing else besides Smoak Yet it hath an Island adjoyning call'd Volcanello annexed to Volcano which they relate to have been generated of the rejected refuses and offalls of the Mountain which it belch'd forth out of the last burning thereof perhaps that in the year 1444 a little before mentioned All the Island springs and abounds with Sulphur Nitre Bitumen Yea and the very bottom of the Sea is burrow'd through with innumerable Caverns and Tunnels or Trunks which both the Vortices or Whirlpools and also the frequency of Winds bursting forth and puffing the Sea after a wonderful manner do shew And this made our Author as himself acknowledges that he could in no wise dissent from those who say There are Submarine Mines and Burrows under the Sea which correspond with Aetna and thence by continued passages and conveyances through the concavous spaces of the Back of Appenine with Vesuvius which he a present and Eye-witness found most true in the said year 1638. when in his return home from these Travels he was driven on the Coasts of Terra di Lavoro in the Kingdom of Naples which he found almost reduced unto utter ruine and desolation at the same time by most horrible Earthquakes wherein he very narrowly escaped himself with his life and accordingly hath writ very sensibly and feelingly thereof too large for this place But on a certain day more curiously viewing Stromboli at this time about sixty miles distant he observ'd it to be more than ordinarily furious For it appear'd wholly overwhelm'd with Fire in so great plenty that it seem'd to belch out flamy Mountains A most horrendous spectacle And then heard I know not what kind of dull murmur from the Mountain so far off which time after time seem'd to grow towards them through