ALUM MINEs are said to have been first found in Italy in the year 1460; and in 1506 King Henry VII. made a monopolizing grant of this commodity to Augustine Chigi, a merchant of Siena. In the year 1609, the manufacture of alum was first invented, and successfully practiced in England, meeting with great encouragement in Yorkshire, where it was first made, from Lord Sheffield, and the other gentlemen of that county. King James I. by advice of his ministry, assumed the monopoly of it to himself, and therefore prohibited the importation of foreign alum; and in 1625 the importation of it was further prohibited by the proclamation of Charles I.