ancient greece mediterranean ruler

Chapter 1055 The Kingdom’s Stone Merchant

Later, in order to avoid being resented by the Soldiers Committee, Laos, a shrewd weapons merchant in Thurii, took the initiative to join forces with the Legion Arms Shop and handed over the high-quality weapons produced to the Legion Arms Shop for sale, which made the Kingdom's weapons market more popular. The legion weapons shop, which had declined in the competition, was revived and soon opened branches in various towns in the kingdom within a few years. Half of its employees were disabled soldiers, and their salaries were not low.

But Arista Grass made a difficult choice-to start a business.He chose the industry he once worked in - quarrying. He asked his comrades to raise money and received strong support from the Soldiers' Committee. He approached the Ministry of Commerce with several disabled soldiers who were willing to work with him, hoping to contract A stone mine.

After the establishment of Dionia, a resolution was passed: the minerals in the territory cannot be sold to businessmen, they can only be contracted. Important mines must not only be auctioned, but also after obtaining the mines, within a specified number of years. The Ministry of Commerce will also send people to supervise, neither allowing its production to be too low, nor allowing it to be over-exploited, so as to ensure that the share it pays to the kingdom every year is constant.

The Ministry of Commerce finally agreed to let Aristagoras contract a quarry in Lucania, not because he was a disabled soldier who should be taken care of, but because the quarry was located in the mountains, with inconvenient transportation and low output. , it is also a limestone mine, and no businessman is willing to take over it, so the Ministry of Commerce let it contract at a lower price and only gave it a one-year contract, just with the mentality of giving it a try.

Unexpectedly, after Aristagoras took over, he overcame many difficulties and not only increased the output of stone mines, but also sold them at a good price (at that time, the Lucania area had been part of Dionia for several years. After vigorous cultural dissemination, the local area The people have gradually accepted the Delnian way of life, living in Greek-style houses and building the temple of Hades, which required a large amount of limestone).

As a result, Aristagoras gained a lot of wealth and won the trust of the Ministry of Commerce. Based on this, and using disabled soldiers as the backbone, he prospered in the stone market of the kingdom and became very famous. stone merchant.

Four years ago, he did not participate in the Turiyi Chamber of Commerce organized by Laos and went to the Latium War Zone because he had just contracted the Turiyi Stone Mine, which was of great significance to both him and the kingdom. Xu's affairs need to be resolved one by one, and he cannot spare time to go to Latium, not to mention that there are no stone mines in the Latium area.

Nowadays, he is a famous stone merchant in the kingdom. He has a group of smart and capable subordinates. He has no longer needed to go to the mine to supervise and direct in person. However, the impact of this project to rebuild the main temple of Hades is very important. The Kingdom Administration Department An order was issued that the marble mines needed for the temple should mainly be provided by the Turiyi Stone Mine (because the stone mines are close to each other, cost less, and are not easily damaged), and all the slaves in the kingdom of Turiyi were also provided to the stone mines for use. Ensure that enough stone is provided to build the temple in a short period of time.Because of this, Aristagoras felt that he had a heavy responsibility and he dared not ignore it. He visited the scene every day for fear of making any mistakes.

Aristagoras first saluted the soldiers escorting the slaves and said seriously: "Thank you for your hard work, brothers!"

Then he asked the foremen: "Which teams do you belong to? How many slaves do you bring?"

The foremen reported the number and number of their formations, and Aristagoras' men picked up the planks, checked them, and said, "Follow me."

The foremen brought the slaves into the mine. Aristagoras stood at the entrance chatting with the team leader and waiting for the subsequent slaves to enter. It was not until he confirmed that all the kingdom slaves had arrived and the number of slaves met that he Said the opponent: "Go and bring in our slaves and pack carts."

The subordinates responded, and did not leave immediately, but reminded: "Boss, according to the judgment of several old sailors, there is likely to be heavy rain in Turui tomorrow, just in case, we have to clear all the mines today. Otherwise, if it really rains heavily and the ground in the mine becomes slippery and muddy, it will be very difficult and dangerous to transport the stones.”

Aristagoras was well aware of the difficulty of mining and transporting ore, and he immediately made a decision: "I will discuss with Boulos (the team officer responsible for escorting the slaves today) to try to extend the working time of the slaves. , ensuring that all the stones can be transported away today."

After speaking, he remembered one more thing, and said: "You take the time to go to the Engineering Academy of Dionia Academy, contact the scholars there, and say what they mentioned last time about building rails to transport ore As for the matter, I have already agreed, and when we finish providing stones for the main temple of Hades, we will invite them to come here to carry out... Well, according to their words, it is called an experiment."

"The people who made the rails are here to transport the ore?" His subordinates were a little confused, and they obviously didn't know about this yet.

"I'm not too sure about the specific situation. You'll know after you arrive at the academy and consult the scholars in detail." Aristagoras waved his hand impatiently.

The School of Engineering of Dionia Academy was established shortly after the end of the Western Mediterranean War. Most of the scholars came from the original School of Mathematics. It is a discipline that puts theoretical science into practice. It is mainly responsible for public buildings and various equipment. the design of.Building railroad tracks and minecarts came from an idea that Davers accidentally mentioned when he inspected the newly established college and talked with scholars. However, scholars regarded it as one of the most important research topics for the new college to expand its influence.

Corsica and Sardinia belong to the kingdom, and the entire Etruscan Union is allied with Dionia, giving the kingdom a sufficient supply of iron ore, solving the resource problem, and Laos is also willing to produce this special, high-quality rails, but it is more difficult to find a mineral merchant willing to cooperate because the initial investment is large, mainly to spend huge sums of money to purchase enough rails (iron is not cheap in the kingdom, even if it is several A few years ago, some new territories with rich iron ore resources were acquired, but the difficulty of mining and transportation undoubtedly pushed up its costs).

Scholars from the Academy of Engineering have discussed with Aristagoras several times, and he has always been hesitant. However, after taking over the kingdom's task of providing stones for the main temple of Hades during this period, due to the tight time and heavy tasks, it was difficult for him to do so. While transporting ore to the main temple in Turiine, he had already lost seven or eight pack oxen and a dozen private slaves were injured. He finally made up his mind to cooperate with the Academy of Engineering to improve the transportation difficulty.

After making this important decision, he felt a lot of pressure in his heart. He was thinking about whether he could get a huge loan from Christoya Bank to ease the financial tension. After all, according to scholars at the Academy of Engineering Said that this is a very important research invention of the kingdom, and King Dionia also attaches great importance to it.

But before that, he had to do another thing. He turned around and said to another subordinate: "You will go to the port in a while and book a passenger ship for me. If it rains really heavily tomorrow, I will go to a passenger ship." Go to Syracuse and inspect the stone mines there. After all, they are also responsible for providing limestone for the main temple, so there can be no mistakes! (Syracuse has the most abundant open-pit limestone resources in the entire Western Mediterranean, Arista Glass contracted the mining rights of one of the stone mines).

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Maximus brought 50 slaves to the mining area they were previously responsible for. He did not start work immediately. Instead, he had to make a judgment first on where to start mining. This must be done by him as the captain. To make a decision, if the initial location is selected well, the subsequent mining will be smoother and casualties will be reduced. This requires the captain to have rich mining experience and vision.

The reason why Maximus can become the foreman's most trusted captain is because he is very organized in doing things. He does not make temporary judgments, but is ready for today's mining at the end of yesterday. This is his role. A work habit developed by several Roman municipal magistrates.

Several vertical and horizontal straight grooves have been poked out on the huge and flat rock in front of them, forming the outline of a rectangular stone.

At this time, Maximus asked six slaves to climb up the rock on wooden ladders. Working in pairs, they hammered pieces of dry wood wedges into the trenches with wooden hammers. When all the trenches were densely embedded, The rock cracked slightly along the groove when I picked up the sawdust.

Maximus immediately ordered the slaves who had brought the water cans to water the wooden wedges. The water flowed into the trench and soaked the wooden wedges. The wooden wedges absorbed water and swelled, becoming larger and larger. The force on the rocks caused the trench to collapse. The cracks are getting bigger and bigger, and this process takes some time.

At the same time, Maximus did not waste this time. After carefully observing the rocks next to him, he began to measure with a tape measure, and then used an ink pen to draw outlines on the rocks. Then there were several slaves Take a board brush (an iron saw embedded in the wooden board) and brush it back and forth along the contour line, eventually carving out a deeper groove.

At this time, the cracks in the nearby rock were getting wider and deeper due to the continuous expansion of the water-absorbing wooden wedge.

Maximus felt that the heat was almost ready, so he sent five more slaves up. Each of them took a long, thin and strong wooden crowbar, inserted it into the crack between the wooden wedges, and began to forcefully pry the stone out. Block, this is an extremely laborious and difficult process.After changing several waves of slaves and breaking several warped bars, the stone finally separated from the rock mass.

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(End of this chapter)