Corinthian Bronze

When I read Trimalchio's explanation of Corinthian bronze, I was naturally dubious. However, while I was sure that his account o was wrong, I have to admit that I did not know the actual story, so I went looking. Apparently, Pliny is our main source on the topic. At the beginning of his section on bronzes, he provides a story i that Corinthian bronze comes from the burning of Corinth by Lucius Mummius in 146 after he won the Battle of Corinth. It is clear that this is the basis for Trimalchio's story about Hannibal melting together all the metals from Troy, however garbled his details. I wonder if Pliny and Petronius were using the same (now lost) sources for the story, or if the putative origin was just common knowledge.

What is even more interesting, though, is that even as Pliny reports this story he is unconvinced by it, arguing that Corinthian bronze existed before the Achaean War, and thus it must have some other origin, though he has no idea what it might be. It is ironic that Trimalchio is wrong not just in detail but in everything.

Modern scholars are not even necessarily convinced that this bronze was an alloy with gold or silver, but just a very nice bronze produced in Corinth. It sounds like this is one of the points scholars could argue forever, since they only have literary evidence like Pliny and Petronius to work with. I like the idea of a copper and gold alloy, so I kind of hope it actually existed.

(I hope I'm not stepping on the toes of any archaeologist who already knew what Corinthian bronze is.)