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Pe-tro′le-um.

A liquid, inflammable, bituminous substance, composed of hydrogen and carbon.

Among the distillates of petroleum are, —

Carbon oil, 59° B and downward.

Benzine, 59° to 64°.

Naphtha, 64° to 70°.

Gasoline, 70° and upward.

Paraffine is also one of the products of petroleum. [1673]

Petroleum in various forms was known in most remote antiquity. The Egyptians used it in embalming their dead. The Jews employed it as a cementing material for their edifices, and the inhabitants of ancient Memphis covered the lower parts of their dwellings on the outside with asphaltum in order to preserve them from the dampness of the surrounding soil. The present petroleum well of Zasynthus, one of the Ionian Islands, was known to Herodotus, more than 2,000 years ago.

Pliny says: A bituminous oil is found on a spring at Agrigentina in Sicily, the waters of which were tainted by it. The inhabitants of the spot collect it on the panicles of reeds, to which it very readily adheres, and make use of it for burning in lamps as a substitute for oil; as also for the cure of itchscab on beasts of burden.

He remarks that the inflammable material found at Samosata was used by the inhabitants to defend themselves against the army of Lucullus: that it would burn on water, and is only extinguished by earth.

In Crawford's “Embassy to Ava,” published about 1826, appears the following: “Petroleum wells supply the whole Burman Empire with oil for lamps and also for smearing wood, to protect it against insects and particularly against the white ant. Its consumption for burning is said to be universal, until its price reaches that of the Sesamun oil, the only other kind used for lamps. The wells, which occupy a space of 16 square miles, vary in depth from 200 to 250 feet; the shaft is square, not more than 4 feet on each side, and is formed by sinking woolen frames. The oil, on coming up, has a temperature of 90° Fah. It is thrown into a large cistern, in the bottom of which are small apertures for the aqueous parts to drain off, when the oil is left for some time to thicken. It is then put into large earthen jars, placed in rude carts drawn by oxen, and carried to the banks of the river, from whence it is sent by water to all parts of the empire.”

He estimates the amount transported by the number of boats engage I in the traffic, their usual load, and the time occupied in an average trip. He puts it at 46,556,400 pounds per annum.

James Young, of Glasgow, undertook the refining of a mineral oil found in a coal-mine in Derbyshire in 1847. Having exhausted his supply, he turned his attention to the distillation of a sort of bituminous shale, known as boghead cannel, from which he extracted an oil which was an excellent lubricant and quite well adapted to illuminating purposes. His sales in England amounted to £ 100,000 in 1854, and in the same year a refinery, operating under his patent, was established in New York for the distillation of Nova Scotia cannel-coal. A number of coal-oil factories were soon after started in various parts of the United States.

The usual process of coal-oil distillation was by placing cannel-coal in retorts similar to those of gas-works and distilling at a moderate temperature.

Natural petroleum had been known to exist in Pennsylvania since a date prior to the war of the Revolution, and in Ohio and West Virginia it was well known, but was considered worthless or a nuisance. The use of Young's coal-oil led to the belief that the natural oil might have a value, and about 1857 efforts were made to bring what was then known to a market, and to discover other supplies. As soon as it was found that artesian wells in the oil-regions would furnish crude petroleum, thousands of wells were sunk, and the supply is now considered inexhaustible, although the annual production fluctuates considerably. See O. L. Well

The annual production of crude petroleum in the United States now reaches at least $20,000,000, and in its refined state it has a value four times as great. The export of petroleum and its products in 1872 was over thirty million dollars.

1877.

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