Hey guys, a friend of mine gave me a book today-- "The Universal Myths: Heroes, Gods, Tricksters and Others", by Alexander Eliot (with contributions by Joseph Campbell & Mircea Eliade; the latter whom Hutton decided to "debunk" in one of his recent books on shamanism, as if yo make his grandfather suck eggs!). Anyway, as I was thumbing through it, I came upon the following passage that I have never heard of, before, in any myths that have come to my attention to date (where the Gods are specifically concerned, as opposed to Renaissance occultism):

"According to classical legend, the minerals common to our planet indicate the erstwhile presence of heavenly bodies here on earth. Iron is the cloak of Mars left behind when he deserted the earth; lead is Saturn's cloak; quicksilver is the claok of Mercury and so on. Gold was the garment of the sun when that burning deity wandered the earth, and silver was the nude moon's headdress" [pp. 94].

So...I was wondering if anyone might know where I might find these specific myths. Hoever, what of Jupiter and tin or Venus and copper *grin*, mythically-speaking? I'd love to find the relavent source-material. *G* When I ran a few search terms through Google this evening, it lead me to a passage from Geoffrey Chacer's The Canterbury Tales; indeed, it has been suggested that one can learn much about the occult prevalent during Chaucer's time from this text. However, the passage in question reads as follows:

"The first of spirits, then, quicksilver is,
The second arsenic, the third, ywis,
Is sal ammoniac, the fourth brimstone.
The seven bodies I'll describe anon:
Sol, gold is, Luna's silver, as we see,
Mars iron, and quicksilver's Mercury,
Saturn is lead, and Jupiter is tin,
And Venus copper, by my father's kin!"
["The Canon's Yeoman's Tale", The Canterbury Tales, stanzas 270-275; c. Thirteenth Century].

Take Care,
Wade