COLLECTION OF THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS

Marcellin Berthelot

INTRODUCTION
LIST OF MEMOIRS CONTAINED IN THE INTRODUCTION

I. — The Leide Papyri.

II. — Relations between the metals and the planets.

III. — The sphere of Democritus and the medical astrologers (figures).

IV. — Alchemical signs and notations (plates).

V. — Figures of apparatus and others.

VI. — Information and notices on some manuscripts.

VII. -- On some metals and minerals from ancient Chaldea.

VIII. — Notices of Mineralogy, Metallurgy and miscellaneous.


Mr. BERTHELOT.

I. — THE LEIDE PAPYRUS

Papyri Graeci musei antiquarii publici Lugduni Batavi edit, interpretationem latinam, adnotationem, indices et tabulas addidit C. LEEMANS, Musei antiquarii Lugduni Batavi Director. — GREEK PAPYRUS in the Museum of Antiquities at Leide, edited, with a Latin translation, notes, indexes and plates by C. LEEMANS, director of the Museum. — Volume II, published in Leide, at the Museum and by EJ Brill, 1885. In-4°, viii-310 pages; 4 boards. — Edition of 150 copies.

The Chemistry of the ancients is known to us mainly through a few articles by Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Vitruvius and Pliny the Elder on materia medica, mineralogy and metallurgy; only comments that we can add up to now to the study and analysis of jewelry, instruments, colors, enamels, vitrifications and ceramic products found in the debris of ancient civilizations. Egypt in particular, so rich in objects of this kind and which a constant tradition attaches to the first origins of Alchemy, that is to say of the old theoretical and philosophical Chemistry; Egypt, I say, has not yet delivered to us any hieroglyphic document relating to the mysterious art of the transformations of matter. We do not know the ancient science of Hermes, the sacred Science par excellence, than by the texts of the Greco-Egyptian alchemists; suspicious source, troubled from the beginning and altered by the mystical imaginations of several generations of dreamers and scholars.

It is in Egypt however, I repeat it, that Alchemy took birth; it is there that the dream of the transmutation of Metals first appears and it obsessed people until the time of Lavoisier. The role he played in the beginnings of Chemistry, the passionate interest he gave to those first researches from which our present science arose, deserve all the attention of the philosopher and the historian. We should also welcome with joy the discovery of the authentic texts provided by the Leide papyri.

The publication of this volume has been long requested and eagerly awaited[1] by persons interested in the history of the ancient sciences, and the contents of the present volume, already known by a summary description of Reuvens (Letters to M Letronne, published at Leide in 1830), seemed likely to pique the curiosity of archaeologists and chemists. Indeed, one of the main papyri found there, papyrus X (pp. 199 to 259 of the current volume), is devoted to recipes for chemistry and alchemy, one hundred and one in number, followed by ten articles taken from Dioscorides. It is the oldest manuscript known today, in which there is question of such subjects: for it dates back to the end of the third century of our era, according to Reuvens and Leemans.

This would therefore be one of those old books of Alchemy of the Egyptians on gold and silver, burned by Diocletian around 290, so that they could not enrich themselves by this art and draw from it the source of wealth. which allowed them to revolt against the Romans.

This systematic destruction is attested to us by the Byzantine chroniclers and by the acts of Saint Procopius;[2] it is in conformity with the practice of Roman law for magical books, a practice which led to the destruction of so many scientific works during the medium freezes.

Fortunately, the Leide papyrus has been removed from it and allows us to compare up to a certain point, and on an absolutely authentic text, the knowledge of the Egyptians of the third century with that of the Greco-Egyptian alchemists, whose works have come down to us through much more modern copies. Both are closely linked with the information provided by Dioscorides, by Théo-p.5phraste and by Pliny on the mineralogy and metallurgy of the ancients; which seems to indicate that several of these recipes date back to the beginnings of the Christian era. They are perhaps even much older, because the technical processes are transmitted from age to age. Their comparison with the notions acquired today on Egyptian metals,[3] on the one hand, and with the alchemical descriptions themselves, on the other hand, confirms and clarifies my previous inductions on the passage between these two orders of notions. I endeavored to penetrate more deeply into these texts, by combining both the insights drawn from the history of the mystical beliefs of the ancients and their technical practices, with those provided by current chemistry: I intended above all to search there for new documents on the origin of the ideas of the alchemists relating to the transmutation of metals, ideas which seem so strange today. My hope has not been deceived; I believe, indeed, to be able to establish that the study of these papyri makes take a step with the question,

The very name of one of the oldest alchemists, Phimenas or Pammenes, is found both in the papyrus and in the Pseudo-Democritus, as that of the author of nearly identical recipes.

Strange destiny of these papyri! they are the notebooks of an artisan forger and a charlatan magician, preserved at Thebes, probably in a tomb, or, more exactly, in a mummy. After having escaped by chance the systematic destruction of the Romans, accidents of all kinds for fifteen centuries, and, something more serious perhaps, the self-interested mutilations of the fellahs dealers in antiquities, these papyri today provide us with a document without the same for appreciating both the industrial processes of the ancients for making alloys, their psychological state and their very prejudices relative to the power of man over nature. The almost absolute concordance of these texts with some of those of the Greek alchemists comes, I repeat, from p. 6support with authentic evidence what we could already induce about the origin of the latter and the time of their composition. At the same time the precision of some of the recipes common to the two orders of documents, recipes still applicable today and sometimes in conformity with those of the Roret Manuals, opposed to the chimerical claim to make gold, adds a new astonishment to our mind . How can we account for the intellectual and mental state of the men who practiced these fraudulent recipes, intended to deceive others by mere appearances, and who had nevertheless ended up deceiving themselves, and believing they were realizing, by some mysterious rite, the actual transformation of these gold and silver-like alloys into real gold and silver?

Be that as it may, we must warmly thank Mr. Leemans for having finished on this point, with a zeal which old age has not exhausted, a work begun in his mature age, forty-two years ago. It is part of the vast publication of the Leide papyri, pursued by him for almost half a century. The Greek papyri, moreover, constitute only a relatively small part of it; they complete the earlier printings of the Greek papyri from Paris,[4] Turin and Berlin.[5] I have already examined the latter from the chemical point of view,[6] as well as those of Leide, according to the indications of Reuvens alone.[7] It is now appropriate to carry out a more in-depth study of these, with the help of the complete text now published, I will do this study, especially from a chemical point of view,

Let us first recall the origin of the Greek papyri in the museum of Leide; then we will briefly describe the main writings contained in volume II, such as papyri V, W and X. In truth, the first two are above all magical and gnostic. But these three papyri are closely associated p.7 with each other, by the place where they were found and even by certain references from papyrus X, purely alchemical, to papyrus V, especially magical. The history of magic and Gnosticism is closely linked to that of the origins of alchemy: current texts in this regard provide new evidence in support of what we already knew.[8] The last papyrus is especially chemical. I will examine the recipes in more detail, giving the translation if necessary, as far as I have succeeded in making it intelligible.

The Leide papyri, Greek, demotic and hieroglyphic, come for the most part from a collection of Egyptian antiquities, brought together at the beginning of the nineteenth century by the Knight of Anastasi, vice-consul of Sweden in Alexandria. In 1828 he ceded this collection to the government of the Netherlands. Many of them have since been published by orders of the Dutch government. I will deal only with the Greek papyri. They form, I repeat, two volumes in-4°, one of 144 pages, the other of 310 pages: this one appeared last year. The Greek text is accompanied by a Latin version, notes and an index, finally by plates representing the facsimile of a few lines or pages of the manuscripts. As regards the plates, we must regret that Mr. Leemans did not think it necessary to make this reproduction, at least for the second volume, by the process of photoengraving on zinc, which provides so cheap texts so clear, absolutely identical with the manuscripts and likely to be drawn typographically in a direct way.[9] The lithographed plates of the Papyri graeci are much less perfect and give only an incomplete idea of ​​these old writings, clearer in reality, as I was able to ascertain on photographic proofs which I owe to the kindness of Mr. Revillout.

Volume I, which appeared in 1843, is devoted to the papyri noted A, B, C, up to V, papyri relating to lawsuits and contracts, except two, which describe dreams: these papyri are curious for the study of customs and Egyptian law; but I will not stop there, for lack of competence.

p.8 I will not stop either in volume II at papyrus Y, which contains only an alphabet, nor at papyrus Z, found at Phil, much later than the others; for it was written in the year 391 of our era, and contains the petition of Apion, "bishop of the legion which garrisoned Syene, Counter-Syene and Elephantine": this petition is addressed to the emperors Theodosius and Valentinian, to claim their help against the incursions and depredations of the barbarians.

On the contrary, let us carefully describe the three magic and alchemical papyri.

PAPYRUS V
Papyrus V is bilingual, Greek and Demotic; it is 3.60 m long, 24 centimeters high; the demotic text occupies 22 columns, each 30 to 35 lines long. The Greek text occupies 17 columns of unequal length.

The beginning and the end are lost. It seems to have been found at Thebes. It was written about the third century, from the style and form of the script, as from the analogy of its contents with the Gnostic doctrines of Marcus. The Greek text is sloppy, full of repetitions, solecisms, case changes, spelling errors attributable to the mode of local pronunciation, such as ai for e and vice versa; ei for i, u for oi, etc. It contains magic formulas: recipes for philters, for incantations and divinations, to procure dreams. These formulas are filled with barbaric words or forged at pleasure and analogous to those which one reads in Iamblichus (De Mysteriis Egyptiorum) and among the Gnostics. Let us only give the following incantation, which does not lack grandeur.

The gates of heaven are open;

The doors of the earth are open;

The road to the sea is open;

The route of the rivers is open;

My spirit has been heard by all the gods and genies:

My spirit was heard by the spirit of heaven;

My spirit has been heard by the spirit of the earth;

My spirit was heard by the spirit of the sea;

My spirit has been heard by the spirit of the rivers.

p.9 This text recalls the refrain of a cuneiform tablet, quoted by F. Lenormand in his work on magic among the Chaldeans.

Spirit of heaven, remember.

Spirit of the earth, remember.

In the current papyrus we find traces of the old Egyptian doctrines, disfigured by the oblivion into which they began to fall. The Jewish names, such as Jao, Sabaoth, Adonal, Abraham, etc., that of the Abraxa, the importance of the magic ring whose stone bears the figure of the serpent biting its tail, a ring which procures glory, power and wealth,[10] the preponderant role attributed to the number seven,[11] "number of letters of the name of God, according to the harmony of the seven tones", the invocation of the great name of God,[12] the quotation of the four bases and the four winds: all this recalls the Gnostics and especially[13] the followers of Marcus, in the 3rd century of our era. The engraved stones of the National Library of Paris also bear the figure of the ouroboros serpent, with the seven vowels and various cabalistic signs[14] of the same order. This serpent also plays a fundamental role in Alchemy. The name of Jesus appears only once in the papyrus, in the middle of a magic formula[15] and without proper attribution. The papyrus therefore has no Christian ties. On the other hand, the Egyptians, the Greeks and the Hebrews are frequently brought together and placed in parallel in the invocations (col. 8, l. 15): which is characteristic. Let us also mention the name of the Parthians,[16] who disappeared before the middle of the third century of our era and of which there is no further question; it appears in papyrus V, as well as in one of the writings of the alchemist Zosimus. Several authors are cited in the papyrus, but they belong to the same genre of literature. Some, such as Zminis the Tentyrite, Hemerius, Agathocles and Urbicus, are magicians, unknown elsewhere. But Apollo Beches (Horus the Sparrowhawk or Pebechius), Ostanes. Democritus and Moses himself already figure under the same title in Pliny the Elder, and they play a great role among the alchemists. On the contrary, in the papyrus, Agathodemon is not yet euhemerized and transformed into a writer, as in the latter it is always the divinity "in whose magical name the earth hastens, hell is troubled, the rivers, the the sea, the lakes, the fountains, are struck with freezing, the rocks are broken; that of which the sky is the head, the ether the body, the earth the feet, and which the ocean surrounds” (pap. V, col. 7, l. 30). There is an indication of greater antiquity there. Ostanes. Democritus and Moses himself already figure under the same title in Pliny the Elder, and they play a great role among the alchemists. On the contrary, in the papyrus, Agathodemon is not yet euhemerized and transformed into a writer, as in the latter it is always the divinity "in whose magical name the earth hastens, hell is troubled, the rivers, the the sea, the lakes, the fountains, are struck with freezing, the rocks are broken; that of which the sky is the head, the ether the body, the earth the feet, and which the ocean surrounds” (pap. V, col. 7, l. 30). There is an indication of greater antiquity there. Ostanes. Democritus and Moses himself already figure under the same title in Pliny the Elder, and they play a great role among the alchemists. On the contrary, in the papyrus, Agathodemon is not yet euhemerized and transformed into a writer, as in the latter it is always the divinity "in whose magical name the earth hastens, hell is troubled, the rivers, the the sea, the lakes, the fountains, are struck with freezing, the rocks are broken; that of which the sky is the head, the ether the body, the earth the feet, and which the ocean surrounds” (pap. V, col. 7, l. 30). There is an indication of greater antiquity there. Agathodemon is not yet euhemerized and transformed into a writer, as with the latter it is always the divinity "in whose magical name the earth hastens, hell is troubled, the rivers, the sea, the lakes, the fountains , are struck with freezing, the rocks break; that of which the sky is the head, the ether the body, the earth the feet, and which the ocean surrounds” (pap. V, col. 7, l. 30). There is an indication of greater antiquity there. Agathodemon is not yet euhemerized and transformed into a writer, as with the latter it is always the divinity "in whose magical name the earth hastens, hell is troubled, the rivers, the sea, the lakes, the fountains , are struck with freezing, the rocks break; that of which the sky is the head, the ether the body, the earth the feet, and which the ocean surrounds” (pap. V, col. 7, l. 30). There is an indication of greater antiquity there.

Three passages deserve special attention for the history of science; they are: the sphere of Democritus, astrological-medical; the secret names given to plants by the sacred scribes; and alchemical recipes. The mixture of these notions, in the same papyrus, with incantations and magic recipes, is characteristic. I will devote a special article to the sphere of Democritus and to the figures of the same order which exist in several Greek manuscripts.

The sacred names of plants give rise to analogous comparisons between the papyrus, the alchemical writings and the work, quite scientific moreover, of Dioscorides. Here is the text of papyrus V (col. 12 end and col. 13).

“Interpretation drawn from the sacred names used by the sacred scribes, in order to frustrate the curiosity of the vulgar. The plants and other things which they used for the images of the gods were designated by them in such a way that, if they were not understood, one was doing vain work, following a wrong path. But we got the interpretation out of it and a lot of hidden descriptions and information. »

There follow 37 names of plants, minerals, etc., the real names being set against the mystical names. These are taken from the blood, semen, tears, bile, excrement and various organs (head, heart, bones, tail, hair, etc.) of Grecian Egyptian gods (Hephaestus or Vulcan, Hermes or Mercury, Vesta, Helios or Sun, Cronus or Saturn, Hercules, Ammon, Ares or Mars); animals (snake, ibis, cynocephalus, pig, crocodile, lion, bull, hawk), and finally man and his various parts (head, eye, shoulder). Seed and blood continually reappear there: serpent's blood, blood of Hephaestus, blood of Vesta, blood of the eye, etc.; lion's seed, Hermes' seed, Ammon's seed; ibis bones, doctor bones, etc. Now this bizarre nomenclature is found in Dioscorides. In describing plants and their uses in his Materia Medica, he gives the synonyms of Greek names in Latin, Egyptian, Dacian, Gallic, etc., a synonymy that contains valuable information. In addition, we see the names taken from the works which bore the names of Ostanes,[17] Zoroaster,[18] Pythagoras,[19] Petesis,[20] authors also cited by alchemists and by the Geoponicas. We read there especially the names given by the prophets,[21] that is to say by the priestly scribes of Egypt: I have noted 54 of these names, formed precisely according to the same rules as the sacred names of the blood papyrus of Mars, Hercules, Hermes, Titan, man, ibis, cat, crocodile; blood from the eye; seed of Hercules, of Hermes, of cat; eye of Python; tail of rat, scorpion, ichneumon; rat nail, ibis; tears of Juno, etc.

There still exists in the popular botanical nomenclature more than one plant name from this space: bull's eye, lion's tooth, dog's tongue, etc., which name perhaps goes back to these old symbolic denominations.[22 ] The word dragon's blood today designates the same drug as in the time of Pliny and Dioscorides. These denominations offered, from the outset, many variants. For, in the papyrus as in Dioscorides, the same name sometimes applies to two or three different plants. Thus the name seed of Hercules designates, in the papyri, the arugula; in Dioscorides, saffron (I, 25), wild myrtle (IV, 144) and hellebore (IV, 148). Cronos' blood means cedar oil and pig's milk, in the papyrus. Other names have a different meaning in the papyrus and in Dioscorides, though unique in each of them. So the seed of Hermes means anise in the papyrus; the bouphthalmon p.12 in Dioscorides (III, 146). Bull's blood signifies the beetle's egg in the papyrus, Marrubium in Dioscorides (III, 109). Conversely, the same plant can have two different names in the two authors. Artemisia is called Vulcan blood in the papyrus, human blood in Dioscorides (III, 117). Only one name is found both in the papyrus and in Dioscorides, it is that of the Anagallis, designated by the word: blood of the eye. the same plant can have two different names in the two authors. Artemisia is called Vulcan blood in the papyrus, human blood in Dioscorides (III, 117). Only one name is found both in the papyrus and in Dioscorides, it is that of the Anagallis, designated by the word: blood of the eye. the same plant can have two different names in the two authors. Artemisia is called Vulcan blood in the papyrus, human blood in Dioscorides (III, 117). Only one name is found both in the papyrus and in Dioscorides, it is that of the Anagallis, designated by the word: blood of the eye.

We see that the nomenclatures of the botanists of that time varied no less than those of our time, even though they proceeded from common symbolic conventions, like those of the Egyptian prophets. Some of these symbolic words have passed to the alchemists, but with a different meaning; such are the names: seed of Venus, taken for the flower (oxide, carbonate, etc.) of copper; serpent's bile, taken for mercury, or else for divine water; ejaculation of the snake, taken for mercury; Osiris,[23] taken for lead (or sulphur); black cow's milk, taken for mercury drawn from sulphur;[24] midge's blood, taken for alabastron water; mud (or dregs) of Vulcan, for barley, etc.; all designations drawn from the old alchemical lexicon. In the papyrus and in Dioscorides, we often find the same words, but with another meaning. All this contributes to reconstituting the intellectual environment and the troubled sources where the first theories of chemistry took place.

Let us come to the few notions of this science of which papyrus V preserves the trace. They are limited to a recipe for ink, in one line (col. 12, l. 16) and to a process for refining gold (col. 6, l. 18).

1° The ink in question is composed with 4 drachmas of misy, 2 drachmas of couperose (green), 2 drachmas of gall nut, 3 drachmas of gum and 4 drachmas of an unknown substance, designated by two Z , in each of which is engaged a small complementary letter. An analogous sign exists among alchemists and physicians and appears to signify for them ginger (see below the table of signs reproduced from a photo-engraving); but this meaning is not applicable here. I believe that it is about p.13 the mystical ink made with the seven perfumes[25] and the seven flowers,[26] by means of which one wrote the magic formulas on the nitre, according to the papyrus following (pap. W, col. 6, l. 5; col. 3, l. 8; col. 9, l. 10; col. 10, l. 41): indeed, the letter Z expresses precisely the number seven , and finds himself, isolated,

This composition recalls, in its complexity, that of Kyphi, the sacred substance[27] of the Egyptians.

2° The process[28] for refining gold (Ἴωσις χρυσοῦ),[29] is not lacking in interest, it is quoted elsewhere in a preparation on the coloring of gold, given in the alchemical papyrus X ; which establishes the connection of the two papyri. Let us add that it is transcribed between a formula for asking for a dream (ὀνειρετητόν) and the description of a magic ring which gives happiness; which clearly shows the intellectual environment of the time: the same people practiced magic and chemistry. Finally, this process contains an interesting recipe, by its resemblance to the method known under the name of royal cement, by the aid of which formerly gold and silver were separated. Let us first give the translation of this text:

p.14 “Take pungent vinegar,[30] thicken, take…,[31] 8 drachmas of common salt, 2 drachmas of lamellar alum (schist), 4 drachmas of litharge, grind with the vinegar for 3 days, decant and use. Then add to the vinegar 1 drachm of rosacea, half an obol of …,[32] three obols of chalcite,[33] one and a half obols of sory,[34] a silique[35] of common salt, two siliques of salt of Cappadocia.[36] Make a blade having two quarters (of an obol?) Submit it to action, fire... until the blade breaks, then take the pieces and look at them as refined gold.

"Having taken four flakes[37] of gold, make a blade of them, heat it and dip it in crushed couperose with water and with another dry (couperose), beat (a part)... with the dry matter, another with the mixed matter pour out the rust and throw in…”

There are two separate recipes here. In both appears the sulphate of copper more or less ferruginous, under the names of chalcanthon or couperose and of sory. The second recipe seems a mutilated fragment of a more extensive formula. The first presents a great resemblance to a formula given in Pliny to prepare a remedy with gold, by communicating to objects roasted with it a specific active property, designated by Pliny under the name of virus. Note that this word is the literal translation of the Greek ἰός, rust or venom, from which derives ἴωσις: which completes the connection between Pliny's formula and that of the papyrus. Here are the words of Pliny (Hist. Nat., XXXIII, 25):

"One roasts the gold in an earthen vessel, with twice its weight of salt and p.15 three times its weight of misy;[38] then the operation is repeated with 2 parts of salt and 1 part of the stone called shale.[39] In this way, it gives active properties to substances heated with it, while remaining pure and intact. The residue is an ash that is kept in an earthen vessel. »

Pliny adds that this residue is used as a remedy. The effectiveness of gold, the most perfect of bodies, against diseases and against evil spells is an old prejudice. Hence, in the Middle Ages, the idea of ​​drinkable gold. The preparation indicated by Pliny must have contained metals foreign to gold, in the form of chlorides or oxychlorides. Did it also contain a gold salt? Strictly speaking, it could be that sodium chloride, in the presence of basic salts of iron peroxide, or even copper dioxide, gives off chlorine, capable of attacking metallic or alloyed gold, forming chloride of gold, or rather a double chloride of this metal. But the thing is not demonstrated. In any case, the gold is refined in the preceding operation.

This is indeed what the comparison of these texts shows with the exposition of the starting process by cementation, given by Macquer (Dictionnaire de chimie, 1778). This is the very difficult problem of separating gold from silver by the dry process. It is easily reached today by the wet route, which dates back to the 17th century. But she was not known before. In the Middle Ages this separation was carried out either by means of royal cement, or by means of a kind of cupellation, quite difficult to achieve, and where sulfur and antimony replaced lead.

Here is the description given by Macquer of royal cement, formerly used in the manufacture of coins. We take 4 parts of crushed and sifted bricks, 1 part of green vitriol, calcined with red, 1 part of common salt; it is made into a firm paste which is moistened with water or urine. It is stratified with thin blades of gold, in an earthen pot; the lid is lute and heated over a moderate fire for twenty-four hours, taking care to melt the gold. The operation is repeated if necessary.

p.16 By proceeding in this way, the silver and the other metals dissolve in the sodium chloride, with the help of the oxidizing and, consequently, chlorinating action, exerted by the iron oxide derived from vitriol; while gold remains unassailed. This process was even employed, according to Macquer, by goldsmiths, who contrived the action, so as to change the surface of a jewel into pure gold, while the central mass remained low grade.

It is easy to recognize the similarity of this process with Pliny's recipe and with that of the Egyptian papyrus. Geber, Albert the Great (pseudonym) and the chemists of the Middle Ages constantly kept the tradition.

PAPYRUS W
Let's move on to papyrus W, which more specifically sheds light on the relationship between magic and Jewish Gnosticism. It is made up of sheets and a half, 0.27m high and 0.32m wide. It contains 25 pages of text in uncial letters, some cursive, each of these pages has from 52 to 31 lines, sometimes less. It dates back to the 3rd century and is very closely related to the doctrines of Marcus and the Carpocratians.[40] It is drawn chiefly from the apocryphal works of Moses, written at that time; he cites, among these works, the Monad, the Secret Book, the Key,[41] the Book of the Archangels, the Lunar Book, perhaps also a Book on the law, the 5th book of the Ptolemaics, the book Panaretos:[ 42] the latter given without author's name. All these works are congeneric and probably contemporaneous with the Domestic Chemistry of Moses, of which I have found extensive fragments in the Greek alchemists[43] p.17 as well as the writings of Moses the magician quoted in Pliny:[44] it is the same family of apocrypha. The current manuscript is, moreover, full of solecisms and spelling errors, attesting to the ignorance of the Egyptian copyists. It quotes Hermes Pteryx, Zoroaster the Persian, Tphe the hierogrammate, author of a book addressed to King Ochus, Manetho the astrologer, the same no doubt as the one whose poem we have, the memoirs of Evenus, Orpheus the theologian? Erotyle, in his Orphics. The names of Orpheus and Erotyle are also found among the Greek alchemists. The name of the second, also cited by Zosimus, was moreover misunderstood and taken for that of a chemical instrument; its reproduction in Papyrus W (Papyri, t. II, p. 254 fixes its definitive meaning. Toth (t. II, p. 103) and the star of the dog (II, 109-115) recall old Egypt. The names of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Michael (t. II, p. 144-153), that of the two Cherubim (t. II, p. 101, the intervention of the temple of Jerusalem (t. II, p. 99), show the Jewish affinities of the author.Apollo and the Pythian serpent (II, 88) manifest the mixture of Greek traditions, as well as in the Berlin papyri and among the alchemists.[45] These affinities are at the same Gnostic times. This is the place to recall that the Marcosians had composed an immense number of apocryphal works, according to Irenaeus (Heresies, 1, 17). The very title stated in the first line of the papyrus: "sacred book called Monas, the eighth of Moses, on the holy name,” is quite in accordance with the doctrines of the Carpocratians, for whom Monas was the great god ignored. [46] The great name or the holy name has magical virtues (Papyri, t. II, p. 99); it makes invisible, it attracts woman to man, it drives out the demon, it cures convulsions, it stops snakes, it calms the anger of kings, etc. The holy name is also called Ogdoade (Papyri, t. II, p. 141) and is made up of seven vowels, the monas completing the number eight. The number seven plays here, as in all this literature, a preponderant role: it is subordinate to that of the divine planets, to each of which is consecrated a plant and a special perfume (Papyri, t. II, p. 33; see below). above the notes on p. 13). The holy name is also called Ogdoade (Papyri, t. II, p. 141) and is made up of seven vowels, the monas completing the number eight. The number seven plays here, as in all this literature, a preponderant role: it is subordinate to that of the divine planets, to each of which is consecrated a plant and a special perfume (Papyri, t. II, p. 33; see below). above the notes on p. 13). The holy name is also called Ogdoade (Papyri, t. II, p. 141) and is made up of seven vowels, the monas completing the number eight. The number seven plays here, as in all this literature, a preponderant role: it is subordinate to that of the divine planets, to each of which is consecrated a plant and a special perfume (Papyri, t. II, p. 33; see below). above the notes on p. 13).

Without dwelling on the formulas of incantation and conjuration, stuffed p.18 with barbarous words, we can note, from the point of view of historical analogies, the mention of the serpent biting its tail and that of the seven vowels surrounding the figure of the crocodile with the head of a hawk, on which stands the polymorphic God (Papyri, t. II, p. 85). Here again is a figure exactly like those which are traced on the gravestones of the National Library. (Origins of Alchemy, p. 62).

Let us also quote the mention of the Agathodemon or divine serpent: “the sky is your head, the ether your body, the earth your feet, and the water surrounds you; you are the ocean that generates all good and nourishes the inhabited earth. »

I note there, in passing, a few chemical words taken in an unusual sense: such is the "tetragonal nitre" (p. 85), on which one must write drawings and complicated formulas. It was certainly not our saltpetre, nor our carbonate of soda, which would hardly lend itself to such operations. The sulphate of soda would perhaps furnish sufficient films; but it is more probable that it is a question here of an insoluble salt, sufficiently hard, such as carbonate of lime (limestone spar), or sulphate of lime, perhaps feldspar because it is a question further on of lick and wash two of its faces (Papyri, t. II, p. 91); there is an enigma here. On this nitre, one writes with an ink made of the seven flowers and the seven spices (Papyri, t. II, p. 90, 99). A sacred “stele” must be painted there containing the following invocation:

“I invoke you, you, the most powerful of the gods, who created everything; you, born of yourself, who sees everything, without being able to be seen. You gave glory and power to the sun. When you appeared, the world existed and light appeared. Everything is subject to you, but none of the gods can see your form, because you transform yourself in all ………… I invoke you under the name which you possess in the language of the birds, in that of the hieroglyphs, in that of the Jews, in that of the Egyptians, in that of the cynocephali ………….. in that of the hawks, in the hieratic language. »

These various mystical languages ​​reappear a little later, after an invocation to Hermes and at the head of a Gnostic account of creation, an account which I reproduce in abridgement, in order to give a more complete idea of ​​this kind of literature which has played such a significant historical role.

“The God of nine forms greets you in hieratic language ... and adds p.19 I precede you, Lord. So saying, he clapped three times. God laughed: cha, cha, cha, cha, cha, cha, cha (seven times), and God having laughed, the seven gods were born who understand the world; for they are the ones who appeared first. When he had burst out laughing, the light appeared and lit up everything; for God was born on the world and on fire. Bessun, berithen, berio.

“He burst out laughing for the second time: it was all water. The earth, having heard the sound, cried out, bowed, and the water was divided into three. The God appeared, he who is appointed over the abyss; without it water can neither increase nor decrease.

At God's third burst of laughter, Hermes appears; on the fifth, Destiny, holding scales and depicting Justice. Its name means the boat of the celestial revolution: another reminiscence of old Egyptian mythology. Then comes the quarrel between Hermes and Destiny, each claiming justice for himself. At the seventh laugh, the soul is born, then the Pythian serpent, which foresees everything.[47]

I have quoted, in abridgement, all this Gnostic travesty of the biblical account of the seven days of creation, in order to show its great resemblance with the Pistis Sophia and congeneric texts, and to highlight the environment in which the first alchemists lived and thought.

PAPYRUS-X
We are now going to examine Papyrus X, especially the chemical papyrus: it testifies to a very subtle and very advanced science of metal alloys and colorings, a science which aimed at the manufacture and falsification of gold and silver materials: in this respect, it opens new days on the origin of the idea of ​​the transmutation of metals. Not only is the idea analogous; but the practices expounded in this papyrus are the same, as I shall establish, as those of the older alchemists, such as Pseudo-Democritus, Zosimus, Olympiodorus, Pseudo-Moses. This demonstration is of the greatest importance for the study of the origins of alchemy. It proves in fact that these origins are not based on purely chimerical imaginations, as has sometimes been believed; but they were based on positive practices and real experiments, by means of which imitations of gold and silver were made. Sometimes the manufacturer confined himself to deceiving the public, without having any illusions about his processes; this is the case of the author of the recipes of the papyrus. Sometimes, on the contrary, he added to his art the use of magic formulas or prayers, and he became the dupe of his own industry.

The definitions of the word “gold”, in the Greek alchemical lexicon which is part of the old manuscripts, are very characteristic: they are three in number, as follows:

“We call gold the white, the dry and the yellow and the golden materials, with the help of which we make solid dyes; »

And this: “Gold is pyrite, and cadmium and sulphur; »

Or again: “Gold is all the fragments and lamellae yellowed and divided and brought to perfection. »

We see that the word "gold", for the alchemists as for the goldsmiths of the Leide papyri, and I would even add, in certain respects, for the goldsmiths and painters of today, had a complex meaning: it served to express first real gold, then low-grade gold, alloys with a golden tint, any gilded object on the surface, finally any material colored gold, natural or artificial. A certain analogous confusion reigns even today, in current language; but it does not reach the bottom of the ideas, as it did formerly. This extension of the meaning of words was indeed common among the ancients; the name of the emerald and that of the sapphire, for example, were applied by the Egyptians to the most diverse precious stones and vitrifications.[48] Just as natural emerald and sapphire were imitated, gold and silver were imitated. Because of the very confused notions then held on the constitution of matter, people thought they could go further and imagined they could achieve it by mysterious artifices. But, to reach the goal, it was necessary to implement the slow actions of nature and those of a supernatural power.

p.21 "Learn, O friend of the Muses, said Olympiodorus, alchemical author of the beginning of the fifth century of our era, learn what the word economy means[49] and do not believe, as some do, that the manual action alone is sufficient: no, it still requires that of nature, and an action superior to man. »

And elsewhere: "So that the composition is realized exactly," says Zosime; ask by your prayers to God to teach you, because men do not transmit science; they are jealous of each other, and the way is not found. afflictions and chastisements, to cause us to abandon the work. »

Hence the need to bring in prayers and magic formulas, either to ward off enemy demons or to conciliate the divinity.

Such was the scientific and moral milieu within which beliefs in the transmutation of metals developed: it is important to remember this. But it is of the greatest interest, in my opinion, to see what the real practices were, the positive manipulations of the operators. Now these practices are revealed to us by the papyrus of Leide, in the clearest form and in accordance with the recipes of Pseudo-Democritus and Olympiodorus. We are thus led to study in detail the recipes of the papyrus, which contains the first form of all these procedures and doctrines. In Pseudo-Democritus, and still more in Zosimus, they are already complicated by mystical imaginations; then came the commentators, who amplified more and more the mystical part, obscuring or eliminating the practical part, to whose exact knowledge they were often strangers. The oldest texts, as often happens, are the clearest here.

Let us first give what is known about the origin of this papyrus, as well as its description. Papyrus X was found at Thebes, probably with the two preceding ones; because the recipe 15 which is there refers to the refining process p.22 of gold quoted in papyrus V (see above, p. 13). It is made up of ten large sheets, 0.30m high and 0.34m wide, folded in half widthwise. It contains sixteen pages of writing, twenty-eight to forty-seven lines, in capital letters from the end of the 3rd century. It contains seventy-five formulas of metallurgy, intended to compose alloys, with a view to the manufacture of cups, vases, images and other goldsmith's objects; for soldering or superficially coloring metals; to test its purity, etc.; formulas arranged without order and with many repetitions. There are also fifteen formulas for making letters of gold or silver, a subject connected with the preceding. The whole looks singularly like the workbook of a goldsmith, working sometimes on pure metals, sometimes on alloyed or falsified metals. These texts are full of idioms, spelling mistakes and grammatical errors: this is indeed the practical language of a craftsman. They also offer the stamp of great sincerity, without a shadow of charlatanism, despite the professional dishonesty of the recipes. Then come eleven recipes for dyeing fabrics in purple color, or in glaucous color. The papyrus ends with ten articles taken from Dioscorides' Materia Medica, relating to the minerals used in the previous recipes. The whole looks singularly like the workbook of a goldsmith, working sometimes on pure metals, sometimes on alloyed or falsified metals. These texts are full of idioms, spelling mistakes and grammatical errors: this is indeed the practical language of a craftsman. They also offer the stamp of great sincerity, without a shadow of charlatanism, despite the professional dishonesty of the recipes. Then come eleven recipes for dyeing fabrics in purple color, or in glaucous color. The papyrus ends with ten articles taken from Dioscorides' Materia Medica, relating to the minerals used in the previous recipes. The whole looks singularly like the workbook of a goldsmith, working sometimes on pure metals, sometimes on alloyed or falsified metals. These texts are full of idioms, spelling mistakes and grammatical errors: this is indeed the practical language of a craftsman. They also offer the stamp of great sincerity, without a shadow of charlatanism, despite the professional dishonesty of the recipes. Then come eleven recipes for dyeing fabrics in purple color, or in glaucous color. The papyrus ends with ten articles taken from Dioscorides' Materia Medica, relating to the minerals used in the previous recipes. spelling and grammatical errors: this is the practical language of a craftsman. They also offer the stamp of great sincerity, without a shadow of charlatanism, despite the professional dishonesty of the recipes. Then come eleven recipes for dyeing fabrics in purple color, or in glaucous color. The papyrus ends with ten articles taken from Dioscorides' Materia Medica, relating to the minerals used in the previous recipes. spelling and grammatical errors: this is the practical language of a craftsman. They also offer the stamp of great sincerity, without a shadow of charlatanism, despite the professional dishonesty of the recipes. Then come eleven recipes for dyeing fabrics in purple color, or in glaucous color. The papyrus ends with ten articles taken from Dioscorides' Materia Medica, relating to the minerals used in the previous recipes.

We see by this enumeration that the same operator practiced goldsmithing and the dyeing of precious fabrics. But it seems foreign to the manufacture of enamels, vitrifications, artificial precious stones. At least no mention is made of it in these recipes, although the subject is treated at length in the writings of the alchemists. Papyrus X, moreover, deals only with goldsmith's objects made with precious metals; weapons, tools and other large utensils, as well as the corresponding alloys, are not listed here.

Recipes relating to metals are listed in no order, one after the other. Let us first look for the general characteristics.

By examining them more closely, we recognize that they have been drawn from various works or traditions. Indeed, the units to which these metallic compositions relate are different, although special for each recipe. The writer sometimes speaks of precise measurements, such as mines, staters, drachmas, etc. (the word drachma or the word stater being preferably used p.23); sometimes he uses the word party; sometimes finally from the word measure.

Tinting of metals is referred to by several distinct words:

Χρυσίου χρῶσις, gold tincture;

ἀργύρου χρύσωσις, gilding of silver;

χαλκοῦ χρυσοφανοῦς ποίησις, (superficial) coloring of copper to gold.

χρίσις, coloring by coatings or varnishes.

χρυσοῦ καταβαφή; it is a gold dyeing, superficial and operated by wet process.

ἀδήμου καταβαηή; this time it is a silver tint, or rather asem, made hot, with temper.

We are dealing, I repeat, with several collections of recipes from various dates and origins, placed end to end. This is confirmed by the repetitions encountered there.

Thus, the same recipe for preparing fusible asèm[50] (amalgam of copper and tin) reappears three times. Asem, in a formula in which it is specially regarded as an amalgam of tin, appears twice with slight variations; coloring in asem, twice; coloring copper to gold with cumin, three times; the apparent gilding, with celandine and misy, twice; writing in gold letters, using gold leaf and gum, twice. Other recipes are reproduced, once abbreviated, another time with development: for example, the preparation of gold solder, the writing in gold letters by means of an amalgam of this metal, the same writing by means of sulfur and the body called alum. By discussing these repetitions more closely, one could try to reconstitute the original collections,

The recipes themselves offer great diversity in the way they are written: some are meticulous descriptions of certain operations, mixtures and strippings, successive meltings, with the use of various fluxes. In others, only the proportions of the primitive metals appear, with p.24 the summary statement of the operations, the fluxes themselves being omitted. For example (pap. X, col. 1, l. 5), we read: lead and tin are purified by pitch and bitumen; they are made solid by alum, Cappadocian salt and Magnesia stone thrown on the surface. In some recipes, only the proportions of the ingredients are indicated, and no mention is made of the operations for which they are intended. So:

“Asèm fusible (col. 2, l. 14): copper from Cyprus, a mine; pewter in rods, a mine; stone of Magnesia, sixteen drachmas; mercury, eight drachmas; stone of Paros, twenty drachmas. »

Sometimes the author limits himself to giving the proportion of only some of the products: “To write in letters of gold (col. 6, l. 1): litharge color of gold one part, alum two parts. »

This is very much like the notes of practitioners, intended to preserve only the memory of an essential point, the rest being entrusted to memory.

The final recipes: Egyptian asèm, according to Phiménas le Saïte; sulfur water; dilution of asem, etc.; have, on the contrary, a character of special complication which recalls the alchemists; as well as the planetary signs of gold and silver, inscribed in the latter.

Two general questions still arise, before tackling the detailed study of these texts, that of the authors cited and that of the signs or abbreviations. A single author is named in Papyrus X, under the title:

Process of Phimenas the Saite for preparing Egyptian asem (col. 11, l. 15). This name appears to be the same as that of Pammenes, alleged tutor of Democritus, quoted by Georges le Syncelle, and which appears in the alchemist texts of our manuscripts.[51] This name is also written Pamenasis and Pamenas, perhaps even Phaminis: devoted to the god Mendes; devoted to King Menas.[52] The connection between Phimenas and Pammenes must be regarded as certain: given that the last of the two recipes given under the name of Phimenas in the papyrus is found almost unchanged in Pseudo-Democritus, among recipes similarly attributed to the Egyptian Pammenes: I will come back to it.

p.25 There is some interest in comparing the signs and abbreviations of the papyrus with the signs of the alchemists. I first note the sign of gold (col. 12, l. 20), which is marl as the astronomical sign of the sun, precisely as with the alchemists: it is the oldest known example of this identification. Next to it is the lunar sign of silver.[53] These symbolic notations do not yet extend to other metals. We also find in the papyrus (col. 9, l. 42 and a sign in the form of an arrowhead, following the words θείου ἀπύρου (apyre sulfur): this sign is similar to that which designates iron, or, in some cases, repeated twice, the stones, in the alchemical writings.[54] In the papyrus it seems that it expresses a measure of weight. The other signs are mainly technical abbreviations, among which I note that of lamellar alum στυπτηρία σχιστή: one of them in particular (pap. X, col. 6, l. 19) is quite similar to that of the alchemists.[55] The names of the measures are abbreviated or replaced by signs, in accordance with a usage that still exists in our time in the technical recipes of the pharmacy.

It is appropriate now to enter into the detailed examination of the one hundred and eleven articles of the papyrus: articles relating to metals, ninety in number, including one on divine water; articles on purple dyeing, eleven in number; finally ten articles taken from Dioscorides. The complete translation of the articles on metals will be given, followed by a commentary; but I will hardly dwell on the dyeing processes properly so called, based mainly on the use of alkanet and orseille, processes some of which are barely indicated in one line: as if the writer had copied scraps of a text he did not understand. Others are more complete. Everything is of the same order as the recipe for dyeing purple from Pseudo-Democritus, contained in the alchemical manuscripts and of which p.

I have carefully collated the ten articles taken from Dioscorides, all relating to the minerals used in the recipes, and which give the measure of the mineralogical knowledge of the author of the papyrus. They concern the following bodies:

Arsenic (our orpiment);

Sandarac (our realgar);

Misy (basic iron sulphate, mixed with copper sulphate);

Cadmium (impure zinc oxide, mixed with copper oxide, or even lead oxide, antimony oxide, arsenious acid, etc.);

Solder of gold or chrysocolla (meaning both an alloy of gold and silver or lead, or else malachite and various congeneric bodies)

Rubric of Sinope (vermilion, or minium, or sanguine);

Alum (our alum and various other astringents);

Natron (nitrum of the ancients, our soda ash, sometimes also sodium sulphate)

Cinnabar (our minium and also our mercury sulphide);

Finally Mercury.

The text of the papyrus on these various points is, on the whole, the same as the text of the known manuscripts of Dioscorides (Sprengel edition, 1829); except that the author of the papyrus suppressed the therapeutic virtues of the minerals, the detail of the preparations and often that of the origins. These deletions, that of medical properties in particular, are obviously systematic.

As for the variants of detail, they are numerous; but most are only of interest to grammarians or editors of Dioscorides.

I note only that, in the article Cinabre, the author of the papyrus distinguishes under the name of minium the cinnabar of Spain; while Sprengel adopted the variant ammion (sand or ore): this confusion between the name of cinnabar and that of minium also exists in Pliny and elsewhere.

The article Mercury gives rise to more important remarks. One finds there p.27 in the papyrus, as in the text of the classic edition of Sprengel, the word ἄμβιξ designating the lid of a vase, lid on the underside of which condense the vapors of the sublimated mercury (αἰθάλη) this same word, joined to the Arabic article al, produced the name alembic. We see that the ambix is ​​today's big top. The still itself and the aludel, an instrument even closer to the previous apparatus, are moreover described in the Greek alchemists; they were therefore known from the 4th or 5th century AD.

The article Mercury of the papyrus lacks a famous phrase that Hoefer, in his History of Chemistry (t. I, p. 149, 2nd edition) had translated in an alchemical sense: "Some think that mercury exists essentially and as a constituent part of metals. " σθαι τὴν ὑδράργυρον. I had at first adopted this interpretation of Hoefer: but thinking about it further, I believe that this sentence means only: "mercury is reported by some to exist natively in the mines." Indeed the word μέταλλα has the double meaning of metals and mines, and the latter is more natural here. In any case, the phrase is missing in the papyrus: either the copyist deleted it to shorten it; either it did not exist then in the manuscripts,

Another variant is not without interest, from the point of view of the discussion of the texts, in the article Mercury. The text given by Sprengel bears: “mercury is kept in vases of glass, or of lead, or of tin, or of silver; for it eats away all other matter and runs off. The mention of the glass is exact; but that of vessels of lead, tin, and silver is absurd; for it is precisely these metals that mercury attacks it could only have been added by an ignorant commentator. Now the papyrus demonstrates that this is really so: for it speaks only of glass vessels, without mentioning metallic vessels. Zosimus also insists on this point.

We know that mercury is transported today in iron vessels, the use of which does not appear to have been known to the ancients.

Let's come to the really original part of the papyrus.

I will first present the translation of the articles relating to metals, ninety in number on p.28, including an article on sulfur water or divine water; and that of the articles on dyeing, eleven in number; then I will comment on the most important points.[56]

TRANSLATION OF THE LEIDE PAPYRUS X
1. Purification and hardening of lead.

“Melt it, sprinkle on the surface lamellar alum and rosacea reduced to a fine powder and mixed, and it will harden. »

2. Other (purification) of tin.

“Lead and white tin are also purified by pitch and bitumen. They are made solid by the alum and salt of Cappadocia, and the stone of Magnesia,[57] thrown on their surface. »

3. Purification of the tin that is thrown into the asem mixture.[58]

“Take pewter purified of any other substance, melt it, let it cool; after covering it with oil and mixing well, melt it again; then having ground oil, bitumen and salt together, rub the metal with them, and melt a third time; after melting, set apart the tin after purifying it by washing; for it will be like hardened silver. When you want to use it in the manufacture of silver objects, so that it is not recognized and that it has the hardness of silver, p.29 mix 4 parts of silver, 3 parts of pewter, and the product will become like an object of silver. »

It is the manufacture of an alloy of silver and tin, intended to simulate silver; or rather a process for doubling the weight of the first metal.

4. Tin purification.

“Liquid pitch and bitumen, one part each; throw (on the tin), melt, stir. Dry pitch, 20 drachmas; bitumen, 12 drachmas. »

5. Making asem.

“Tin, 12 drachmas; mercury, 4 drachmas; land of Chios,[59] 2 drachmas. To the molten tin, add the crushed earth, then the mercury, stir with iron, and implement (the product). »

6. Doubling of asem.

Here is how we operate the doubling of the asèm.

“We take: refined copper, 40 drachmas; asem, 8 drachmas; pewter in button, 40 drachmas; the copper is first melted and, after two heatings, the tin; then asem. When both are softened, remelt several times and cool using the previous composition.[60] After augmenting the metal by such processes, clean it with the coupholite.[61] The tripling is carried out by the same processes, the weights being distributed in accordance with what has been said above. »

It is an amalgamated white bronze, analogous to certain bell metal.

7. Inexhaustible (or perpetual) mass.

“It is prepared by the procedures defined in the doubling of the asem If you want to take 8 drachmas from the mass, separate them and recast 4 drachmas of this mime asem; melt them three times and repeat, then cool and store them in the cupholite. »

See also recipe 60.

p.30 There is the idea of ​​a ferment, intended to contribute to the multiplication of metallic matter.

8. Making asem.

“Take pewter in small pieces and soft, four times purified; take 4 parts and 3 parts pure white copper and 1 part asem. Melt, and, after melting, clean several times, and manufacture with what you want it will be first quality asem, which will even deceive the workers. »

White alloy, analogous to the preceding; with intent to defraud.

9. Manufacture of fusible asem.

“Cyprus copper, 1 mine; tin in rods, 1 mine; stone of Magnesia, 16 drachmas; mercury, 8 drachmas? Poros stone,[62] 20 drachmas”.

“Having melted the copper, throw in the tin, then the powdered Magnesia stone, then the Poros stone, finally the mercury; shake with iron and pour when needed. »

Analogous alloy, with added mercury.

10. Doubling of asem.

“Take some refined Cyprus copper, throw on it equal parts, that is to say 4 drachmas of salt of Ammon[63] and 4 drachmas of alum; melt and add equal parts of asèm. »

Bronze enriched with copper.

11. Making asem.

“Carefully purify lead with pitch and bitumen, or tin; and mix the cadmium[64] and the litharge, in equal parts, with the lead, and stir p.31 until perfect mixture and solidification. It is used like natural asem.[65] »

Complex alloy containing lead, or tin, and zinc.

12. Manufacture of asem.

"Take the clippings[66] of the (metallic) leaves, soak in vinegar and lamellar white alum and leave them wet for seven days, and then melt with the copper quarter 8 drachmas of Chios land,[67] and 8 drachmas of Asemian earth,[68] and 1 drachma of Cappadocian salt, plus lamellar alum, 1 drachma; mix, melt, and throw black on the surface. »

13. Making the mixture.

“Copper from Gaul,[69] 8 drachmas; tin in rods, 12 drachmas; stone of Magnesia, 6 drachmas; mercury, 10 drachmas; asem, 5 drachmas. »

14. Making the mixture for a preparation.

“Copper, 1 lead (weight), melt and cast therein 1 lead of tin in buttons and work thus. »

15. Coloring of gold.

“To color the gold to make it good for use. Misy and salt and vinegar from the purification of gold; mix everything and throw into the vase (which contains) the gold described in the previous preparation; leave for some time and, having removed the gold from the vase, heat it over coals; then again throw it into the vase which contains the aforesaid preparation; do this several times, until it becomes good for use. »

This is a ripening recipe, which refers to the preparation described above (p. 14); which shows that the alchemical papyrus X and the p.32 magic papyrus V followed each other and were composed by the same writer.

16. Increase in gold.

“To increase the gold, take cadmium from Thrace, mix with cadmium in crusts,[70] or that of Gaul. »

This sentence is the beginning of a more extensive recipe; because it must be supplemented by the following, which is its continuation: the second title fraud of gold being probably a gloss which passed into the text, by the error of the copyist.

17. Gold Fraud.

“Misy and red of Sinope[71] equal parts for one part gold. After the gold has been thrown into the furnace and it has become of a beautiful hue, throw in these two ingredients and, removing (the gold), let it cool, and the gold is doubled. »

The cadmium in crusts, that is to say the less volatile portion of the metallic oxides condensed on the walls of the copper smelting furnaces, contained, besides the oxide of zinc, oxides of copper and of lead. In addition, some reducing substance, omitted from the recipe, had to be used. The whole formed an alloy of gold and lead, with copper and perhaps zinc. It was therefore in sum a falsification, as the gloss indicates.

18. Manufacture of asem.

“Tin, a tenth of a mine; copper from Cyprus, one-sixteenth of a mine; ore of Magnesia, one thirty-second; mercury, two staters (weight). Melt the copper, first throw in the tin, then the stone of Magnesia; then, having melted these materials, add to them an eighth of fine white asem, of a consistent nature. Then, when the mixture has taken place and at the time of cooling, or remelting together, then add the mercury last. »

p.33 19. Other (formula).

“Cyprus copper, 4 staters; land of Samos, 4 staters; lamellar alum, staters; common salt, 2 staters; blackened asèm, 2 staters, or, if you want to make it more beautiful, 4 staters. Having melted the copper, spread over it the earth of Chios and the lamellar alum ground together, stir so as to mix; and, having melted this asem, flow. Having mixed what has just been melted with (wood of) juniper, remove; before removing it, after heating, quench the product in lamellar alum and salt, taken in equal parts, with viscous water; minimal thickening; and, if you want to finish the job, dip again in the aforesaid mixture; heat it, so that (the metal) becomes whiter. Take care to use copper refined beforehand; having heated it at the beginning and subjected it to the action of the bellows, until he cast off his scale and became pure; and then use it, as just written.

It is still an alloying process, but for which the proportion of copper in the already prepared asem is increased, which should bring the bronze obtained closer to the color of gold.

20. Other (form).

“Take a Ptolemaic stater;[72] for they contain copper in their composition, and quench it; now the composition of the liquid for quenching is this: lamellar alum, common salt in vinegar for quenching viscous thickening. After quenching and when the molten metal has been cleaned and mixed with this composition, heat, then quench, then remove, then heat. »

20 bis (untitled).

“Here is the composition of the liquid for steeping lamellar alum, common salt in vinegar for quenching, viscous thickening; having dipped in this mixture, heat, then dip, then remove, then heat when you have dipped four or more times, heating each time before, the (metal) will become superior to the blackened asem. The more treatments, heatings and temperings, the more it will improve. »

p.34 These are pickling and refining formulas, in which no new metal enters. It seems that, in this, it is a question either of heightening the tint, as is done in goldsmithery, even in our time; or to pass off a currency rich in copper for a silver currency, by dissolving the copper on the surface.

Indeed, goldsmiths today use various analogous recipes to give gold a beautiful tint.

21. Treatment of hard asem.

“How it should be done to change the hard and black asèm into (a metal) soft and white. Taking castor leaves, infuse in water one day; then wet in water before melting and melt twice and sprinkle with aphronitron.[73] And throw in the melting of the alum; employ. It has the quality, because it is beautiful. »

22. Other (form).

“Help for all spoiled asem. Taking straw and barley and wild rue, brew in vinegar, pour salt and coals into it; throw everything into the stove, blow for a long time and leave to cool. »

These are processes for refining an oxidized or sulphidic metal on the surface.

23. Copper bleaching.

“To whiten the copper, in order to mix it with the asem in equal parts, without being able to recognize it. Taking copper from Cyprus, smelt it, throwing on it 1 lead of decomposed sandarac,[74] 2 drachmas of iron-colored sandarac, 5 drachmas of lamellar alum, and smelt. In the second melting, one throws 4 drachmas of wax of the Bridge, or less; we heat and we sink. »

It is here a falsification, by which the copper is dyed by means of arsenic. The recipe is very close to that of the alchemists. — Today white copper or white tombac is prepared by a similar process (with the help of black flux).

p.35 24. Tin hardening.

“To harden pewter, sprinkle separately (on its surface) lamellar alum and rosacea; if, moreover, you have purified the tin properly and used the materials mentioned above, so that it does not escape them by flowing during heating, you will have Egyptian asem for the manufacture of objects (of goldsmithery). »

5. Coated with gold.

“To coat gold, in other words to purify gold and make it shiny: misy, 4 parts; alum, 4 parts; salt, 4 parts. Grind with water. And having coated the gold, place it in an earthen vessel deposited in a furnace and lute with clay, until the aforesaid materials have been melted, [75] remove it and clean it carefully. »

26. Purification of money.

“How to purify silver and make it shiny. Take a part of silver and an equal weight of lead; put in a furnace, keep molten until the lead has been consumed; repeat the operation several times, until it becomes shiny. »

It is an incompletely described cupellation.

Strabo already points out this method.

27. Silver coloring.

“To silver copper objects: tin in rods, 2 drachmas mercury, 2 drachmas; land of Chios, 2 drachmas. Melt the tin, throw on it the crushed earth, then the mercury, and stir with iron and form into globules. »

It is the manufacture of a tin amalgam, intended to whiten the copper.

28. Manufacture of copper similar to gold.

“Crush some cumin: pour water on it, mix it up, leave it in contact for three days. On the fourth day, shake it, and if you want to use it as a coating, mix it with chrysocolla;[76] and gold will appear. »

p.36 It's a varnish.

29. Manufacture of fusible asèm.

“Cyprus copper, 1 part; tin, 1 part; Magnesia stone, 1 part, coarse Paros stone finely ground.... First copper is melted, then tin, then Magnesia stone;[77] then the pulverized Paros stone is thrown in; stir with iron and perform the operation of the crucible. »

30. Manufacture of asem.

“Tin, a measure; copper from Gaul, half a measure. First melt the copper, then the tin, stir with iron, and throw on the dry pitch, until saturation; then pour, melt again, using lamellar alum, like pitch; and then pour. If you want to melt the tin first, then the copper filings above, follow the same proportion and the same step. »

31. Preparation of chrysocolla.[78]

“Gold soldering is prepared as follows: Cyprus copper, 4 parts; asem, 2 parts; gold, 1 part. First the copper is melted, then the asem, then the gold. »

32. Recognize the purity of pewter.

“After melting, put paper underneath and pour: if the paper burns, the tin contains lead. »

This process is based on the fact that tin melts at a lower temperature than lead, a temperature incapable of carbonizing the paper.

Pliny gives a similar process (HN XXXIV, 48). A manipulation of the same order is still carried out today in chemistry classes.

33. Manufacture of solder for working gold.

“How it is appropriate to make the solder for gold works: gold, 2 parts; copper, 1 part; melt, divide. When you want a shiny color, blend with a little silver. »

p.37 These are goldsmith's recipes. We read the same today in the Manuel Roret (1832):

“Fine silver, 1 part; copper, 1 part; melt together, add gold, 2 parts. »

34. Process for writing in gold letters.

To write in letters of gold, take mercury, pour it into a clean vessel, and add gold leaf; when the gold appears dissolved in the mercury, stir vigorously add a little gum, 1 grain, for example, and, leaving it to stand, write letters in gold. »

35. Other (recipe).

“Litharge gold color, 1 part; alum, 2 parts. »

36. Making black asem like obsidian.[79]

“Asem, 2 parts; lead, 4 parts. Place on an empty earthen vessel, throw in it a triple weight of apyre sulphur,[80] and, having put it in the furnace, melt it. And having fired it from the furnace, knock, and do what you want. If you want to make a figured object, in beaten metal, or cast, then file and cut: it does not rust. »

It is an alloy blackened by metal sulphides.

Pliny describes a similar preparation, used in Egypt (HN XXXIII, 46).

37. Manufacture of asem.

“Good tin, 1 part; melt; add to it: dry pitch, one third of the weight of tin; having stirred, let the pitch skim until it has been entirely thrown out; then, after the tin has cooled, melt it again and add 13 drachmas of tin, 1 drachma of mercury, stir; let cool and work like asem. »

It is refined tin, with the addition of a little mercury.

38. To make copper objects look like gold.

“And let neither contact nor friction against the touchstone reveal them; but that they can be used especially for (the manufacture of) a ring of beautiful p.38 appearance. Here is the preparation. We grind the gold and the lead into a fine powder like flour, 2 parts of lead for 1 of gold, then, having mixed, we incorporate with gum, and we coat the ring with this mixture ; then we heat it up. This is repeated several times, until the object has taken on the color. It is difficult to detect (fraud); because friction gives the mark of a golden object; and the heat consumes the lead, but not the gold. »

39. Writing in gold letters.

“Letters of Gold: Saffron; river turtle bile. »

40. Manufacture of asem.

“Take white tin, very divided, purify it four times; then take 4 parts, and a quarter of pure white copper and 1 part of asèm, melt: when the mixture has been melted, sprinkle it with as much salt as possible, and make what you want, either cups, whatever you like. The metal will be the same as the initial asem, so as to deceive even the workers. »

41. Other process.

“Silver, 2 parts; purified tin, 3 parts; copper.., drachmas; melt; then remove and strip; implement as for works of silver of the first order. »

42. Coated with copper.

“If you want copper to have the color of silver; after having carefully purified the copper, put it in mercury and white lead: mercury alone suffices for the coating. »

It is copper simply whitened on the surface by mercury.

43. Test of gold.

“If you want to test the purity of gold, remelt it and heat it: if it is pure, it retains its color after heating and remains like a coin. If it becomes whiter, it contains silver; if it becomes coarser and harder, it contains copper and tin; if it blackens and softens, lead. »

This rough test method responds to exact observations.

p.39 44. Money trial.

“Heat the silver or melt it, like gold; and, if it remains white, shining, it is pure and not defrauded; if it looks black, it contains lead; if it looks hard and yellow, it contains copper. »

Pliny gives a similar process (HN XXXIII, 44). We see from this that the Egyptian goldsmiths, while seeking to deceive the public, reserved for themselves methods of control.

45. Writing in gold letters.

“Writing Golden Letters. Write whatever you want with goldsmith's solder and vinegar. »

46. ​​Stripping copper objects.

“Having cooked the chard, carefully pickle the copper and silver objects with the juice. Boil the chard in water. »

47. Copper like gold.

“Copper similar to gold in color, be it: grind cumin in water; let stand carefully for three days; the fourth, having watered abundantly, coat the copper and write what you will. Because coating and writing look the same. »

48. Stripping of silver objects.

“Clean with sheep's wool, after soaking in pungent brine; then scour with fresh (sugar?) water and do job. »

49. Gilding of silver.

“To gild without leaves (of gold), a vase of silver or copper, melt yellow natron and salt with water, rub with it and it will be (golden). »

Obscure recipe. It refers to yellow natron, a body referred to in Pliny, HN XXXI, 46. Pliny gives it as a native salt; but, in the preceding lines, he speaks of the fusion of natron with sulphur: which would form a sulphide, capable indeed of dyeing metals. Zosimus also points out yellow natron.

p.40 50. Writing in gold letters.

“Crush the arsenic[81] with gum, then with well water; third, write. »

5i. Silver gilding.

“Crush the misy with sandarac and cinnabar and rub the silver object with it. »

53. Writing in gold letters.

“After drying gold leaf, grind with gum and write. »

54. Preparation of liquid gold.

“Place gold leaves in a mortar, grind them with mercury and it will be done. »

55. Gold coloring.

"How gilded silver should be prepared." Dilute cinnabar with alum, pour white vinegar over it, and having brought the whole to a waxy consistency, squeeze several times and let it pass overnight. »

It seems that this is a preliminary coating.

56. Preparation of gold.

“Asem, 1 stater, or Cyprus copper, 3; 4 gold staters; fuse together. »

It is a low-grade gold preparation.

57. Other preparation.

“To gild silver in a sustainable way. Take mercury and gold leaf, shape into the consistency of wax; taking the silver vase, scour it with the alum, and taking a little of the waxy material, coat it with the polisher and let the material settle; do this five times. Hold the vase with a clean linen cloth, so that it does not get dirty; and taking embers, prepare ashes, soften with the polisher and use it as a golden vessel. It can stand the test of regular gold. »

p.41 These last words show that it is a process of falsification, the test of the touchstone.

58. Writing in gold letters.

“Arsenic gold color, 20 drachmas; powdered glass, 4 staters; or egg white, 2 staters, white gum, 20 staters, saffron,… after writing, let dry and polish with a tooth.[82] »

59. Manufacture of asem.

“We also prepare asem with copper; (silver,) 2 leads; tin in button, i mine; first melting the copper, throw in the tin and some cupholite, called chalk,[83] half a mine per mine; continue until you see the silver and the chalk melting; after the rest has been dissipated and the silver alone remains, then allow it to cool, and employ it as asem preferable to genuine……..”

60. Other (preparation).

“The perpetual asèm[84] is prepared as follows: 1 stater of bel asèm; add to it 2 staters of refined copper, melt two or three times. »

61. Tin bleaching.

“To whiten tin. Having heated with alum and natron, melt. »

62. Writing in asem letters.

“Dissolve rosacea and sulfur with vinegar; write with thickened material. »

63. Writing in gold letters.

“Flower of the cnecos[85] white gum, egg white mixed in a shell, and incorporate with turtle bile, to the esteem, as one does pure colors; do job. Very bitter calf bile is also used for color. »

p.42 Here the color is organic based.

64. Test of asem.

“To recognize if asem is defrauded. Place in brine, heat; if it is cheated, it blackens. »

This recipe is obscure. Does it refer to the formation of a copper oxychloride?

65. Pickling of tin.

“Place some gypsum in a rag and clean. »

66. Stripping silver.

“Use wet alum. »

The same today, in the Manuel Roret (t. II, p. 195; 1832).

“Dissolve alum, concentrate, skim it, add soap and rub the silver with a cloth soaked in this composition. »

67. Tincture of asem.

“Cinnabar, 1 part; lamellar alum, 1 part; Cimolian land, 1 part; moisten with sea water and apply. »

68. Softening of copper.

“Heat it; place it in the bird droppings and after cooling remove. »

69. Tincture of gold.

“Grilled Misy, 3 parts; lamellar alum, celandine, about 1 part; grind in the consistency of honey with the urine of a prepubescent child and color the object; heat and soak in cold water. »

70. Writing in gold letters.

Take a quart of proven gold, melt in a goldsmith's crucible; when it is melted, add a keration (carat, third of an obol) of lead; after it has been mixed, remove and cool and take a jasper mortar, throw the melted matter into it; add 1 keration of natron and mix the powder carefully with spicy vinegar, like medicinal eye drops, for three days; then, when the mixture is done, stir in 1 keration (measure) of lamellar alum, write and polish with a tooth. »

p.43 71. Writing in gold letters.

“Ductile gold leaf; grind with mercury in a mortar; and use it to write, like black ink. »

72. Other (preparation).

“Apyre sulphur,..., lamellar alum...; eraser ...; sprinkle the gum with water. »

73. Other (preparation).

“Apyre sulphur, ..., lamellar alum, a drachma; add in the middle of dry rust; grind rust, sulfur and alum finely; mix for the best, grind carefully, and use it as black ink for writing, diluting in wine free from sea water. Write on papyrus and parchment. »

74. Other (preparation).

“Write in letters of gold, without gold. Celandine, 1 part; pure resin, 1 part; arsenic golden color, 1 part, of that which is fragile; pure gum; turtle bile, 1 part; liquid part of eggs, 5 parts; take from all these dry matters the weight of 20 staters; then throw in 4 staters of Cilicia saffron. It is used not only on paper or parchment but also on well-polished marble; or if you want to make a beautiful design on some other object and make it look like gold. »

75. Gilding.

“Gilding having the same effect. Lamellar arsenic, rosacea, golden sandarac,[86] mercury, gum tragacanth, pith of arum, in equal parts; mix together with goat bile. It is applied to copper objects passed through the fire, to silver objects, to figures of (metal) and to small shields. The brass must not have any roughness. »

p.44 76. Other (process).

“Misy of mines, 3 staters; mine alum, 3 staters; celandine, 1 stater; pour into it the urine of a prepubescent child; grind until the mixture becomes viscous and dip(-y) the object). »

77. Other (process).

“Take some cumin, grind it, leave it to infuse in water for three days, remove it for the fourth; coat copper objects with it, or whatever you want. The vase must be kept closed for three days. »

78. Writing in gold letters.

“Crush gold leaf with gum, dry and use like black ink. »

79. Writing in silver letters.

“Writing silver letters. Litharge, 4 staters; dilute with dove droppings and vinegar; write with a fired stylus. »

80. Tincture of asem (or in color of asem).

“Cinnabar, Cimolian earth, liquid alum, equal parts; mix with sea water, heat and soak several times. »

81. Silver coloring.

“So that it can only be removed by fire. »

“Chrysocolla and white lead and earth from Chios, and mercury ground together; add honey and, having first treated the vase with natron, smear. »

82. Tin hardening.

“Melt it, add to it a homogeneous mixture of lamellar alum and rosacea; pulverize, and sprinkle (the metal), and it will be hard. »

The hardening (σκλήρωσις, σκληρασία) of tin and lead[87] are regarded here as correlative to their purification.

83. Manufacture of asem.

“Good tin, 1 mine; dry pitch, 13 staters: bitumen, 8 staters; ground p.45 in a terracotta vase lute around; after having cooled, mix 10 staters of copper in round grains and 3 staters of anterior asem and 12 staters of crushed Magnesia stone. Melt and do what you want.

84. Manufacture of Egyptian asem.

“Recipe from Phiménas le Saïte. Take soft Cyprus copper, purify it with vinegar, salt and alum; after having purified it, melt by throwing on 10 staters of copper 3 staters of quite pure ceruse, 2 staters of litharge color of gold (or coming from the cupellation of gold), then it will become white; then add 2 staters of very sweet and flawless asem, and we will obtain the product. Prevent by melting that there is liquation. This is not the work of an ignoramus, but of an experienced man, and the union of the two metals will be good. »

This recipe is very clear, except for the omission of the agents intended to reduce litharge and white lead,

85. Other (process).

“Exact preparation of asem, preferable to that of asem itself. Take: orichalcum,[88] for example, 1 drachma; put in the crucible until it flows; throw on it 4 drachmas of sal ammoniac,[89] or Cappadocian; melt again, add lamellar alum, the weight of an Egyptian bean; melt again, add 1 drachma of decomposed sandarac,[90] not golden sandarac, but whitening one; then transport in another p.46 crucible coated with the lead of earth from Chios; after fusion, add a third of asèm and use. »

This preparation gives an alloy of copper and arsenical zinc.

86. Other (process)

“Take: tin, 12 drachmas; mercury, 4 drachmas: land of Chios, 2 drachmas; melt tin; throw in the powdered earth, then stir the mercury with a piece of iron; globulate. »

87. Doubling of gold.

“To increase the weight of gold. Melt with the quarter cadmium, and it will become heavier and harder. »

It was obviously necessary to add a reducing agent and a fondant, which the recipe does not mention. One thus obtained an alloy of gold with the metals whose oxides constituted cadmium, that is to say, zinc, copper, or lead especially; gold-rich alloy. The same recipe can also be read in Pseudo-Democritus, but as always more complicated and more obscure. What follows is clearer.

88. Other (process).

“One alters the gold by increasing it with misy and Sinope earth;[91] one first throws it in equal parts into the furnace; when it has become clear in the crucible, one adds of each what is appropriate, and the gold is doubled. »

89. Other (process).

“Invention of sulfur water.[92] A handful of lime, and as much sulfur in fine powder; place them in a vase containing strong vinegar, or the urine of a prepubescent child;[93] heat from below, until the supernatant liquor appears like blood; decant this properly to separate it from the deposit, and use. »

A calcium polysulphide is thus prepared, capable of attacking gold, at least when dry, and also capable of dyeing metals wet.

Sulfur water or divine water plays a very big role among the Greek alchemists.

90. How to dilute asem.

"Having reduced the asem into sheets and having coated it with mercury, and strongly applied to the sheet, the sheet thus laid out is sprinkled with pyrite, and placed on charcoal, to dry it and until the leaf color appears changed; for the mercury evaporates and the leaf softens. Then one incorporates in the crucible 1 part of gold,[94] 2 parts of silver;[95] having mixed them, throw on the rust which floats arsenic color of gold, pyrite, sal ammoniac ,[96] chalcite,[97] blue,[98] and having ground with water of sulfur, roast, then spread the mercury on the surface. »

The following recipes are purple dye recipes.

91. Fixing the alkanet.

“Sheep urine; or arbutus, or henbane alike. »

It is a fragment of a recipe with no follow-up, probably collected by an ignorant copyist. Unless it is a simple detail, intended to complete a recipe known to the reader.

p.48 92. Dilution (falsification) of the alkanet.

“We dilute the alkanet with the pine cones (?), the inside part of the peaches, the purslane, the juice of the chard, the wine lees, the urine of the camel and the inside of the lemons. »

93. Fixing the alkanet.

“Cotyledon[99] and alum mixed in equal parts, grind finely, throw in the alkanet. »

94. Styptic Agents.

“Melanteria,[100] calcined rosacea, alum, chalcitis, cinnabar, lime, pomegranate bark, prickly tree pod, urine with aloes: these things serve as tinctures. »

95. Preparation of the purple.

“Break into small pieces the stone of Phrygia;[101] boil and, having immersed the wool, leave until cool; then throwing into the vessel a mine (weight) of seaweed,[102] boil and throw therein a mine of seaweed; boil and throw in the wool, and, letting it cool, wash in sea water [the stone of Phrygia is roasted,[103] before being crushed], until it turns purple. »

96. Tincture of purple.

“Wet the lime with water and leave to stand overnight; having decanted, lay the wool in the liquor for a day; remove it, dry; having sprinkled the alkanet with vinegar, boil and throw in the wool and it will come out dyed purple — (the alkanet boiled with water and natron produces the color purple). »

“Then dry the wool, and dye it as follows: Boil the seaweed with water, and, when it has been exhausted, throw an imperceptible quantity of rosacea into the water, in order to develop the purple , and then dip the wool in it, and it will be dyed: if there is too much rosacea, it becomes darker. »

There are two distinct processes here, one with the alkanet, the other with the orseille.

97. Other (process).

“Crush nuts with good quality alkanet; that done, put some strong vinegar in it; grind again; add pomegranate bark to it; leave three days; and afterwards, dip the wool in it and it will be cold dyed. »

There is said to be a certain acanthus[104] which furnishes purple color; moistened with natron of Berenice, instead of walnuts, it produces the same effect. »

98. Other (process).

“Clean the wool with fuller's grass, and have lamellar alum available; grinding the inner part of the gall, throw with the alum in a jar, then put the wool and leave for a couple of hours; take it off and let it dry. First, follow this step. Having crushed the dregs[105] and having put it in a vase, pour sea water, stir and leave to settle. Then decant the clear water into another vase and keep it at your disposal. Taking some alkanet and putting it in a vase, mix with the water of the dregs, until it thickens suitably and becomes like sand. Then put the product in the vase (reserved), diluting by hand with the previous water that comes from the alkanet. Then, when it has become viscous, put it in a small pot, add the rest of the alkanet water, and leave until it has cooled down; then dip the wool in it, leave it for a few hours and you will find the solid purple. »

99. Other (process).

“Taking alkanet, leontice, [106] take off the bark, take it to grind it in a mortar, as fine as antimony add to it mead diluted with water, grind again, put the ground product in a vase, and boil: when you see it warm (the liquor), immerse the wool in it; let stay. The wool should be cleaned with fuller's grass and thickened (carded and felted). So take it, dip it in lime water,[107] let it soak; remove it, wash strongly with sea salt, dry; dive back into the alkanet and let it stay. »

100. Other (process).

“Take the juice from the upper parts of the alkanet and a compact gall nut [omphacite[108]] roasted in the roasting pan; having crushed it with the addition of a little rosacea, mix with the juice, boil, and give the purple tincture. »

101. Glaucous color substitution.[109]

“Instead of glaucous color, take iron slag, crush it carefully until reduced to the appearance of smegma,[110] and boil with vinegar, until it hardens; immerse the previously cleaned wool with the thickened fuller's grass (carded and felted), and you will find it dyed purple; thus dye with the colors you have. »

DIOSCORIDE. Extracts from the book on Materia Medica.
102. Arsenic. — 103. Sandarac. — 104. Misy. — 105. Caddy. — 106. Chrysocolla. — 107. Rubric of Sinope. — 108. Alum. — 109. Natron. — 110. Cinnabar. — 111. Mercury.

p.51 We limit ourselves to recalling these titles for the record, the articles having been taken from a known and published work (see p. 26).

EXPLANATION OF THE LEIDE PAPYRUS RECIPES
These texts being known, it is now a question of bringing them together and drawing certain conclusions from them.

Recipes relating to metals are the most numerous and the most interesting. They show first of all the correlation between the profession of the goldsmith, who worked precious metals, and that of the hierogrammate or sacred scribe, obliged to trace on monuments of marble or stone, as well as on books. in papyrus or parchment, gold or silver characters: the recipes given for gilding jewelry in papyrus are indeed the same as for writing in gold letters. We shall begin with this last order of recipes, the applications of which are all special, before entering into the detail of the metallic preparations; for they form a kind of introduction to the processes of dyeing metals.

I. — Recipes for writing in gold letters.
The art of writing in gold or silver letters greatly preoccupied the craftsmen who used our papyrus; there are not less than fifteen or sixteen formulas on this subject, treated also several times in the manuscripts of our libraries; Montfaucon and Fabricius have already published several recipes, taken from them.

Let us quickly recall those of the papyrus:

Crushed gold leaf with gum (53) and (78)

This process still appears today in the Manuel Roret (t. II, p. 136; 1832) [Triturate a gold leaf with honey and gum, until pulverized, etc.]

p.52 Amalgamated gold and gum (34) and (71).

Gold Amalgam (54).

In another recipe (70) and (45), an alloy of gold and lead is first prepared, to which certain preparations are subjected.

In the previous recipes, the gold forms the base of the coloring principle. But substitutes were also used to write in gold color, without gold: for example, an intimate mixture of native sulphur, alum and rust, (72) and (73), diluted in wine;

And again: litharge gold color (35)

Saffron and turtle bile (39);

Copper rendered like gold by a coating of cumin (47); see also (77).

Safflower flower and turtle or calf bile (63).

The following recipes are based on the use of orpiment (arsenic of the ancients); such are recipes (50) and (58), with the addition of saffron.

In another more complicated preparation (74), orpiment, celandine, turtle bile and saffron are associated, following a composite recipe.

Orpiment appears here as a material used for its own color, and not as a dye for metals, a job it took on later.

There is still a recipe (62) for writing in letters of asèm (alloy of silver and gold), using rosacea, sulfur and vinegar; that is, without gold or silver;

And a recipe (79) for writing in silver letters, with litharge diluted in dove droppings and vinegar.

There are similar recipes today in the Manuel Roret (t. II, p. 140; 1832): “Pulverized tin and gelatin, we form a coating, we polish with a burnisher; a layer of oil or shellac varnish is added, which gives a white or golden color to wood, leather, iron, etc. »

If I have given some details about these recipes for writing gold or silver letters, it is because they clearly characterize the people for whom they were intended. These are, I repeat, precise formulas of practitioners, especially interesting the scribe who transcribed this papyrus, and the whole class, so important in Egypt, of hierogrammats; because it was not only a question of writing and drawing on papyrus, but also p.53 on marble or on any other support. Some of these recipes, by a singular transition, have become, as I will say soon, recipes for true transmutation.

II. — Handling of Metals.

Let's come to the formulas relating to the manipulation of metals. They bear the trace of a common concern: that of a goldsmith preparing metals and alloys for the objects of his trade, and pursuing a dual goal. On the one hand, he sought to give them the appearance of gold and silver, either by a superficial dye, or by the manufacture of alloys containing neither gold nor silver, but likely to deceive unskilled people and even to trained workers, as he expressly says. On the other hand, it aimed to increase the weight of gold and silver by introducing foreign metals, without changing their appearance. These are all operations to which goldsmiths still engage today; but the State imposed on them the use of special marks, intended to define the real title of jewels tested in official laboratories, and he carefully separated the trade in fakes, that is to say imitations, as well as that of doubled, from the trade in authentic metals. Despite all these precautions, the public is continually disappointed, because it does not know and cannot know enough about the marks and the means of control.

There are special temptations here: professional fraud does not always seem, in the minds of people in the profession, to come under the rules of common probity. The price of gold is so high, the benefits resulting from its substitution by another metal are so great, that even today there is an incessant pressure exerted on the part of goldsmiths in this direction, pressure to which the public authorities find it difficult to resist. Its purpose is either to lower the fineness of the gold alloys used in goldsmithery, while selling them as pure gold; or to sell at the price of the total weight, estimated as gold, the jewels containing enamels or pieces of iron or other metals; even in our time, this is a commercial tradition that we have not succeeded in prohibiting. Already it was said in the last century, at the time of trades organized by corporations: It seems that the art of deceiving has its principles and its rules; it is a tradition that the master teaches his apprentice, which the whole body keeps as an important secret. Here, as in many other industries, there is a perpetual tendency to operate substitutions and alterations of material, very lucrative for the merchant and carried out in such a way that the public does not notice it; without however putting themselves in flagrant contradiction with the text of the laws and regulations. Beyond that begins crime, and it is not uncommon for the limit to be crossed. there is a perpetual tendency to operate substitutions and alterations of material, very lucrative for the merchant and executed in such a way that the public does not notice it; without however putting themselves in flagrant contradiction with the text of the laws and regulations. Beyond that begins crime, and it is not uncommon for the limit to be crossed. there is a perpetual tendency to operate substitutions and alterations of material, very lucrative for the merchant and executed in such a way that the public does not notice it; without however putting themselves in flagrant contradiction with the text of the laws and regulations. Beyond that begins crime, and it is not uncommon for the limit to be crossed.

Now these laws and regulations, this rigorous separation between the industry of forgery, doubled, plated, imitations, and the industry of real gold and real silver, these legal marks, these precise means of analysis at our disposal today, did not exist in ancient times. The Leide papyrus is dedicated to developing the processes by which the goldsmiths of that time imitated precious metals and deceived the public. The manufacture of the double and that of the filled jewels do not appear in these recipes, although we find traces of it in Pliny.[111] The recipes here are of a purely chemical nature, that is to say that the intention of fraud is less obvious. From there, however, to the idea that it was possible to make the imitation so perfect that it became identical to reality, there was only one step.

Transmutation was all the easier to conceive in the ideas of the time as pure metals, endowed with definite characters, were not then distinguished from their alloys, each and the other bearing specific names, regarded as equivalent. . Such is the case of brass (oes), a complex and variable alloy, assimilated to pure copper, and which was often designated by the same name. Our word bronze reproduces the same complexity; but it is no longer a definite metal for us. The word copper itself marl often applies to yellow or white alloys, in common language today and in that of craftsmen. Likewise the orichalcum, which after several variations has become our brass;[112] the chrysochalcum, which has become our chrysocale or similor, &c. Electrum, a natural alloy of gold and silver, was used to make coins in Asia Minor, (Lydia and cities of Ionia), in Campania and Carthage, where care was taken to subject them to cementation, intended to give them the appearance of gold pure (vp 16). Corinthian brass, an alloy containing gold, copper and silver, was not unlike the fourth grade of gold, used today in jewelry. The monetary alloy, used for current coins, was also a clean metal; of marl that our ridge of today; the planet Mars is even attributed to it, in the same way as the other planets with simple metals, in the old list of Celsus. Claudianon and molybdochalcum, poorly known alloys of copper and lead, often cited by alchemists, are not without analogy with tinsel, pewter and with certain artistic brasses or bronzes, specially pointed out in various passages of Zosimus. But they have disappeared, in the midst of the many alloys that we now know how to form between copper, zinc, lead, tin, antimony and other metals. Strabo's pseudargyre is an alloy which has also left no other historical trace; maybe it contained nickel. The Romans sometimes added to monetary bronze (copper and tin), lead, up to the dose of 29% in their currencies. Pliny's stannum was an alloy analogous to claudianon, sometimes containing silver, and whose name came to be identified with that of white lead, another alloy varying from the compounds of lead and silver, which occur during the processing of lead ores, up to pure tin, which he ended up meaning exclusively. The pewter p.56 minted by Dionysius of Syracuse, according to Aristotle, must have been an alloy of this order; even in the time of the Severes pewter coins were made, simulating silver (Lenormant, La Monnaie dans l'Antiquité, p. 213) and which have come down to us.

From the point of view of imitation or reproduction of gold and silver, the most important alloy was asem, often identified with electrum, an alloy of gold and silver found in nature: but the meaning of the word asèm is more comprehensive. Papyrus X offers a great deal of interest in this respect, because of the multiplied formulas of asem which it contains. It is on the manufacture of asèm in fact that the imitation of gold and silver revolves above all, according to the recipes of the papyrus: it is also its manufacture and that of molybdochalque, which are the starting point of the alchemists' transmutation processes. All this history draws a singular light from the texts of the papyrus which clearly specify what it was already allowed to induce in this respect:[113] I will bring them closer to the texts of the old alchemists that I have specially studied.

So let's take a closer look at the discussion of the papyrus. We find there first recipes for the surface dyeing of metals:[114] such as gilding and silvering, intended to give the illusion of real gold and silver and assimilated either to writing in letters of gold and silver, or with dyeing in purple, the recipes of which follow. Sometimes we proceeded by the addition of a liniment or a varnish: sometimes, on the contrary, we removed from the surface of the jewel the metals other than gold, by a cementation which left some to remain in the invisible state and hidden the compound nucleus (vp 16).

There are also recipes intended to accomplish a deeper imitation: for example, by combining the real metal, gold or silver, with a more or less considerable dose of less precious metals; it was the diplosis operation, which is still practiced today.[115] But the Egyptian goldsmith p.57 believed or pretended to make believe that the true metal was really multiplied, by an operation comparable to fermentation; two texts from the papyrus [inexhaustible mass, recipes (7) and (60), etc.] show this clearly. This, moreover, is the very notion of the first alchemists, clearly exposed in Aeneas of Gaza.[116]

Finally, the falsification is sometimes complete, the alloy not containing any trace of initial gold or silver. This is how the alchemists hoped to achieve integral transmutation.

In these various operations, mercury plays an essential role, a role that has persisted to the present day, when it has been replaced for gilding by electrical processes. Arsenic, sulfur and their compounds also appear as dyeing agents: which completes the assimilation of the recipes of the papyrus with those of the alchemists.

The various processes employed in the papyrus, to recognize the purity of metals (docimasie, 43, 44, 64, 32; to refine and purify them (15, gold), (26, silver), (2, 3, 4, pewter), (21, 22, asèm); to pickle them, an operation which precedes soldering or gilding (46, 48, 65, 66, 20, 20 bis), are recalled here only for the record.

When it comes to soldering metals, there are only two recipes for soldering gold (chrysocolla). Note that this name has several very different meanings among the ancients: it means sometimes malachite,[117] sometimes an alloy of gold with silver,[118] or with lead, sometimes with copper; these various bodies being implemented simultaneously. Finally, we find it applied in Olympiodorus to the operation itself, by which the particles or metallic spangles were united into a single mass. It is an alloy of gold and copper, associated with silver or asem, which is designated by this name in our papyrus, recipes (31) and (33).

Let's come to the processes for gilding, silvering, dyeing and coloring metals superficially. Two pickling formulas mentioned above (19, 20, 20 bis) already have this destination; for the purpose of deception, it seems, by altering the appearance of the currency. The recipe (25) tends towards the same goal: p.58 it is roughly that of royal cement, by means of which one separated gold from silver and other metals (p. 11). Used as above, it causes pure gold to appear on the surface of the golden object, the center remaining alloyed with the other metals. It is therefore a process of fraud (vp 16). Maison could also use it to polish gold.

Even today goldsmiths use various analogous recipes to give gold a beautiful tint:

“Matte gold, saltpetre, alum, salt;

“Fine gold, with added arsenious acid;

“Red gold, by addition of a copper salt;

“Yellow gold, by adding saltpetre, sal ammoniac.

“To buff and polish. Raw tartar, 2 ounces; powdered sulfur, 2 ounces; sea ​​salt, 4 ounces; boil in equal parts of water and urine; dip the gold, or the gilded work, into it. (Manuel Roret, vol. II, p. 188; 1832).

Sulfur and urine are found here, in the Roret manual, as among the Egyptian alchemists.

Here are now some real gilding processes. One of them (38) is remarkable, because it proceeds without mercury, by means of a lead alloy: it perhaps represents a practice prior to the knowledge of mercury, of which there is no question until the fifth century BC.

In any case, it is always a device to deceive the buyer, as the text expressly says.

Another method (57) is for gilding silver, by application with gold leaf and mercury. The object, says the author, can undergo the test of regular gold (the touchstone): it is therefore a process of fraud.

Other recipes only give the appearance of gold: it is communicated to copper by the use of cumin for example (28); with variants (47) and (77).

Let us recall here the recipes for writing in gold color with the help of saffron, safflower and calf or turtle bile (89), (63), (74). Pliny also explains that bronze is colored gold with bull's gall (HN XXVIII, 146).

Another recipe is intended to gild without gold a silver or copper vase, by means of yellow natron, a poorly known substance (49): it was p.59 perhaps a sulphide, capable of dyeing metals superficially ( vp 39).

A recipe for gilding silver (51) is based on the use of sandarac (ie realgar), cinnabar and misy (basic copper and iron sulphates). She thus observes the appearance of arsenical compounds to dye gold. But these compounds seem to be employed here only by application, without the intervention of chemical reactions, such as those which, on the contrary, form the basis of the methods of transmutation by arsenic among the alchemists.

A superficial gilding appearance (69) and (76) is based on the use of grilled misy, alum and celandine, with the addition of urine.

These processes of superficial dyeing have become a process of transmutation in Pseudo-Democritus (Physica and Mystica, which is expressed thus:

“Make the cinnabar[119] white by means of oil, or vinegar, or honey, or brine, or alum; then yellow, by means of misy, or sory, or rosacea, or apyre sulphur, or as you like. Throw the mixture on silver and you will get gold, if you have dyed it in gold; if it is copper, you will have electrum: for nature enjoys nature. »

This recipe is reproduced with more details a little later, in the same author.

Elsewhere, Pseudo-Democritus gives a process based on the use of saffron and celandine, to color the surface of silver or copper and dye it gold: which conforms to the recipes for writing in gold letters. exposed above.

Celandine also appears associated with orpiment, in one of the papyrus recipes for writing in gold letters on paper, parchment, or marble (74).

Next is a process of gilding by varnishing, based on the simultaneous use of arsenic compounds, bile and mercury (75).

p.60 This process recalls in certain respects the following varnish, to give a golden color to any metal (Manuel Roret, t. II, p. 192; 1832)

“Dragon's blood, sulfur and water, boil, filter; we put this water in a matrass with the metal we want to color. We mouth, we boil, we distill. The residue is a yellow color, which tints metals gold. One can also operate with equal parts of aloe, saltpeter, and sulphate of copper. »

The following processes are silvering processes, all based on an apparent coloring, operated without silver. Thus (42), under the name of copper coating, it is taught to whiten copper by rubbing it with mercury. It is still today a process for giving copper coins the appearance of silver and trick inattentive people.

Similarly a tin amalgam, intended to whiten copper (27).

Likewise the process for coloring silver (81).

The dyeing in asèm color (80) and (67), intermediate between gold and silver, is repeated twice.

Let us also cite a recipe for whitening copper with arsenic (23).

Instead of dyeing the surface of metals, to give them the appearance of gold or silver, the Egyptian goldsmiths learned early to dye them thoroughly, that is to say by modifying them in all their mass. The processes employed by them consisted of preparing alloys of gold and silver that retained the appearance of the metal: this was what they called diplosis, the art of doubling the weight of gold and silver. silver (see above p. 56); an expression which passed to the alchemists, at the same time as the claim to obtain metals in this way, not simply mixed, but thoroughly transformed. The current word double refers to the same order of ideas, but with a completely different meaning, since it is now two superimposed metal blades. Among the ancients the meaning was more extensive. In effect, the word diplosis formerly implied, sometimes the simple increase in weight of the precious metal, added to a metal of lesser value which did not change its appearance, (16) and (17), (56), (87) and (88); sometimes the fabrication from scratch of gold and silver, by the transmutation of the nature of the added metal; all metals being basically identical, in accordance with the Platonic theories on raw material p.61. The very agent of the transformation is a portion of the previous alloy, playing the role of ferment. in accordance with Platonic theories on raw material p.61. The very agent of the transformation is a portion of the previous alloy, playing the role of ferment. in accordance with Platonic theories on raw material p.61. The very agent of the transformation is a portion of the previous alloy, playing the role of ferment.

All these preparations are as clear and positive, except for the uncertainty about the meaning of a few words, as our current recipes. It is all the more surprising to see the birth, in the midst of such precise technical processes, of the chimera of a veritable transmutation; it is, moreover, correlative with the intention of falsifying metals. The forger, by dint of deceiving the public, ended by believing in the reality of his work; he believed in it, as well as the dupe he had at first proposed to make. Indeed, the relationship of these recipes with those of the alchemists can now be completely established.

I have already pointed out the identity of some papyrus recipes for gilding with the Pseudo-Democritus recipes for transmutation; I will continue this demonstration later by talking about asem. It is striking for the diplosis of Moses,[120] a recipe as brief, as clear as that of the Leide papyri and probably drawn from the same sources; at least if we judge by the role of Moses in these same papyri (this volume, p. 16).

The process of Moses, exposed in a few lines, is this:

“Take copper, arsenic (orpiment), sulfur and lead;[121] the mixture is ground with horseradish oil; it is roasted over coals until desulphurization; we withdraw; one takes of this burnt copper 1 part and 3 parts of gold; put in a crucible; we heat; and you will find it all changed to gold, with the help of God. »

It is a low-grade gold alloy, similar to those mentioned above.

The silver solders of goldsmiths today are still executed using arsenical compounds. We read for example in the Manuel Roret, t. II, p. 186 (1832).

“3 parts silver, 1 part bronze: melt; throw in a little powdered orpiment.

“Other: fine silver, 1 ounce; thin brass, 1 ounce; arsenic, 1 oz. First, the silver and the brass are melted and the arsenic is added.

p.62 “Other: silver, 4 ounces; brass, 3 ounces; arsenic, 2 large.

“Other: silver, 2 ounces; tinsel, 1 ounce; arsenic, 4 large; sink away; good welding. »

It will be noted that the very statement of these formulas nowadays takes on a form analogous to that of the formulas of the papyrus (23 in particular) and of the manuscripts. It is, moreover, by analogous recipes that white tombac, or white copper, and false English silver are prepared today. In any case, the copper is dyed in the papyrus by means of arsenic, as with the alchemists; all with an avowed intention of falsification.

Eugenius' formula, which follows in the Venetian manuscript, is somewhat more complex than that of Moses.

It is also based on the use of burnt copper, mixed with gold and melted, to which orpiment is added: this compound, treated with vinegar, is exposed to the sun for two days, then it is dried; it is added to silver, which makes it similar to electrum; the whole added to the gold, in equal parts, consumes the operation.

It is always the same kind of alloys, which the author claims to ultimately identify with pure gold.

III. — Manufacture of Asem.
The crux of the matter is in the making of asem.

The asèm[122] of the Egyptians originally designated electrum, an alloy of gold and silver, which is found in nature and which is easily produced in the processing of ores. Its name was translated among the ancient Greeks by that of ashmon, ashmoV, or ashmh, which was also that of unmarked silver, that is. that is to say without title, which has become among the modern Greeks the very name of money. Hence the extreme confusion in the texts. But originally Egyptian asem had its own meaning, as the Leide papyri show without a doubt. According to Lepsius, moreover, asem was regarded as a distinct metal, comparable to gold and silver; it is figured next to them p.63 on the Egyptian monuments. It was likewise placed under the patronage of a planetary deity, Jupiter, who was later attributed to tin,

However, this so-called metal varied notably in its properties, according to the relative doses of gold, silver and other simple bodies, allied in its constitution: but then the thing did not appear more surprising than the variation of the properties of brass. , a name which included both our red copper, and the bronzes and brasses of today.

That's not all: the asèm enjoyed a strange ability: depending on the treatments undergone, it could provide pure gold, or pure silver, that is to say, be changed in appearance into these two other metals.

Finally, and vice versa, it could be made artificially, by combining gold and silver together, or even without gold, and without silver and, moreover, with a combination of other metals, such as copper, tin, zinc, lead, arsenic, mercury, which varied its color and various properties: we will shortly cite many examples of this type of manufacture (see also p. 54 and 56, formulas of falsified currencies).

It was therefore both a natural metal and a fake metal. It established the transition of gold and silver between themselves and with the other metals and seemed to furnish proof of the reciprocal transmutation of all these substances, simple metals and alloys. Moreover, we knew how to extract gold and silver from them in a large number of cases, at least by a qualitative analysis, and we succeeded in doing so even in circumstances, such as the treatment of argentiferous lead, where it does not It did not seem that silver had been introduced in advance into the mixtures capable of furnishing this metal.

Such are the facts and the appearances which served as bases for the practices, the conceptions and the beliefs of the goldsmiths of the papyri of Leide, like those of the Greco-Egyptian alchemists of our manuscripts. We see from this that, given the state of knowledge at the time, these conceptions and these beliefs did not have the chimerical character that they have assumed for us; now that the simple metals are definitively distinguished, one in relation to the other, as in relation to their alloys. The only surprising thing is the question of fact: I mean that practitioners have believed for so long in the reality of complete transmutation, when they only made alloys with the appearance of gold and silver, alloys of which we now have, thanks to the papyrus of Leide, the precise formulas. Now these formulas are the same as those of the alchemical manuscripts. In fact, these were instruments of fraud and illusion vis-à-vis the ignorant public. But how could people in the trade have believed for so long that they could really, by craftsmanship, or by magic formulas, succeed in changing these appearances into reality? There is an intellectual state there that confuses us. Anyway, it is interesting to push the knowledge of facts to its last degree, and that is what I will try to do. succeed in changing these appearances into reality? There is an intellectual state there that confuses us. Anyway, it is interesting to push the knowledge of facts to its last degree, and that is what I will try to do. succeed in changing these appearances into reality? There is an intellectual state there that confuses us. Anyway, it is interesting to push the knowledge of facts to its last degree, and that is what I will try to do.

The number of recipes relating to asem amounts to 28 or 30; this is more than a quarter of the total number of articles in the papyrus. They include processes for manufacturing from scratch; processes for making black asem, corresponding to what we call oxidized silver; asem dyeing processes; to make letters of this color, to try the asèm; finally processes for doubling and multiplying the dose of asem, for diluting it, etc.: which corresponds to the diplosis of gold, mentioned above (pp. 56 and 60).

Let's go into some details, starting with the manufacturing processes, which highlight the real character of asèm. We find designated by this name, independently of the natural asèm or electrum, alloy of gold and silver figured on the Egyptian monuments:

1° An alloy of tin and silver (3).

It is a process of diplosis of money.

2° A tin amalgam, (5) and (86).

Here it is only a question of simulating the money.

In another recipe (37), the refined pewter is simply added with a little mercury: which shows that the dose of the latter varied.

3° Refined tin has sometimes been identified with asèm (vp 55), as shown in the following recipe, taken from manuscript 299 of Saint Mark (M, fol. 106, recto):

“Take refined tin, melt it and, after five fusions, throw bitumen on its surface in the crucible; and each time you melt it again, sink it in common salt, until it becomes a perfect and abundant asem.

p.65 This is the formula (3) of the papyrus, in which it precedes the manufacture of an alloy of tin and silver. In any case, it shows the perfect similarity of the recipes of the papyrus and those of the manuscript of Saint Mark.

4° The name of the asèm seems to have also been applied to an alloy of lead and silver, obtained in the fusion of lead ores; as the following text establishes,[123] taken from the manuscript of Saint Mark (fol. 106, recto)

“Take fusible lead, drawn from washed ores. The fusible lead is very compact. It is melted several times, until it becomes asem. After having obtained the asem, if you want to purify it, throw Cleopatra's glass into the crucible and you will have pure asem; because fusible lead provides a lot of asem. Heat the crucible on a moderate fire and not too strong. »

And a little further down:

“The asem is extracted from purified lead, as it is written on the stele above.[124] You should know that one hundred pounds of ordinary lead provides ten pounds of asem. »

In the other recipes, copper always intervenes; the appearance and properties of the alloy were thereby brought closer to those of gold. Asem therefore formed, as well as natural electrum, the transition between gold and silver. However, in none of the recipes except the last Gold is added; which clearly shows the intention of imitation, or rather of fraud.

5° An alloy of tin and copper, a sort of bronze where tin was dominant (30); or it was taken equally (29) and (14).

6° An analogous alloy, with the addition of anterior asem (8) and (40).

The intention to defraud is very explicitly acknowledged here.

In this formula, it is not a question of fluxes and knacks for refining the alloy, but they are described in detail in another recipe (19), by which one increases the proportion of copper in the asèm p .66 already prepared: which was to bring the bronze obtained closer to the color of gold. Similarly (83), in a recipe where the precautions to avoid oxidation are described.

7° An alloy of silver, tin and copper (41).

A similar recipe, a little more detailed and with half the tin, ends with these words: "Use it like asem, preferable to the real one (59). »

8° An amalgam of copper and tin (9) and (29).

9° An amalgam of copper, tin and asem (13) and (18).

It is a variant of the previous formula.

These recipes seem to relate to these fundamental prescriptions of Pseudo-Democritus: “Fix mercury with the body (or metal) of magnesia. Magnesia was, properly speaking, sometimes the magnet stone, with the addition of various metals and metallic oxides, sometimes a metallic sulphide containing iron, copper, lead, &c.

10° An alloy of lead, copper, zinc and tin (11); with these words at the end: “We use it like natural asem. »

Here we see the idea of ​​imitating natural metal through art, by analogy with the artificial reproduction of precious stones.

11° An alloy of lead, copper and asem (84), designated under the name of Egyptian asem, according to the recipe of Phiménas le Saïte, a character who is the same as the Pammenès of the alchemists. Indeed, he is expressly cited by Pseudo-Democritus, as an artist in Chrysopeia, at the beginning of a series of recipes for making asem (p. 24).

This order of alloys recalls the English metal of our day, formed of 80 parts of copper; 4, 3 lead; 10.1 tin; 5, 6 zinc.

Likewise the Indian alloy: 16 parts of copper; 4 lead parts; 2 parts tin; 16 parts of zinc;

Or the metal of Prince Robert: 4 parts of copper and 2 of zinc;

Copper and zinc alloys (100 copper, 8 to 14 zinc);

Alloys of copper (100 parts), zinc and tin 3 to 7 parts each);

Argentan, packfong, Chinese white copper, nickel silver; alloys of copper (from 3 to 5 parts) with zinc and nickel (equal parts, p.67 forming half or two thirds of the weight of copper), with the addition of a little lead;

And a large number of complex alloys of the same order, coppers, bronzes and white and yellow brasses still used in industry: the variety is infinite.

12° An alloy of asem and arsenical orichalcum (brass), described following the preceding (85).

This complicated recipe, where arsenic intervenes, is quite reminiscent of that of the alchemists. We read, for example, in Pseudo-Democritus (Physica et Mystica, Greek Text, I, 7)

“Manufacture of yellow gold. — Take claudianon,[125] make it shiny and treat it according to use, until it turns yellow. Let us therefore turn yellow: I do not say with the stone, but with its useful portion. You will turn yellow with decomposed alum,[126] with sulphur, or arsenic (sulphide), or sandarac (realgar), or titanos (limestone), or as you wish: if you add silver to it , you will have gold; if you put gold, you will have gold coral;[127] for the victorious nature dominates nature. »

The process seems the same; but it is less clear in the alchemist and it has become a method of transmutation. A similar recipe can be found a little later in the same author.

Here is another summary of the recipe of Olympiodore, alchemist author of the fifth century, which is very clear.

“First dye to dye copper white. — Arsenic is a kind of sulfur that volatilizes in fire. Take golden arsenic, 14 ounces; porphyrise, soak in vinegar two or three days and air dry, mix with 5 ounces of Cappadocian salt;[128] the use of this salt p.68 has been proposed by Africanus. One places above the vessel which contains the mixture a vial or vase of glass and above another vial, fastened on all sides, so that the burnt arsenic does not dissipate.[129] Burn it several times, until it has turned white: in this way white and compact alum is obtained.[130] Then copper is melted with Nicene oak ashes,[131] then you take natron flower,[132] you throw 2 or 3 parts of it into the bottom of the crucible to soften it. Then you project the dry powder (arsenic) with an iron spoon, 1 ounce for 2 ounces of copper; then you add a little silver to the crucible, to make the dye uniform; you throw a little more salt. You will thus have a very nice asèm. »

We see that the recipes of the first alchemists are in no way chimerical, but similar to those of the papyrus and even to the recipes of goldsmiths and metallurgists today.

Let us come to the processes of diplosis proper, intended to increase the weight of asem, considered as a defined metal, processes analogous to the diplosis of gold and silver described above and giving alloys more or less rich in copper (6), (10) and (90).

In the last process, it seems that it is a question of increasing the weight of the asèm and of modifying its color. It is softened by amalgamation, in order to be able to incorporate gold, silver, sulphur, arsenic and copper. The last metals are drawn from their sulphides, dissolved or disaggregated by the calcium polysulphide, which forms the whole sulfur water, with the help of the grids and a new final amalgamation. This is quite the process of the transmuting alchemist.

A special mention is due to the substance called udwr qeion: which means sulfur water, or divine water, a substance which has an enormous role among alchemists, who continually play on the double meaning of this word. This liquor is designated in the alchemical lexicon under the name of serpent's bile; denomination which is attributed to Petesis, the only author cited p.69 in this lexicon, who also appears in Dioscorides, as well as Phimenas or Pammenes, designated both in the papyrus and in Pseudo-Democritus. These names represent two real characters, two of those prophets or chemist priests who founded our science.

Sulfur water appears for the first time in papyrus X (89. The recipe is very clear: it designates the preparation of a calcium polysulphide. In the following recipe (90), which is very complicated, we put in implement the liquor above.

This liquor prepared with native sulfur (ὕδωρ θείου ἀθίκτου) is described in various passages of the alchemists, for example in the small summary of Zosimus entitled: γνησία γραφή, authentic writing. Let us recall here that the descriptions of Zosimus refer in various places to liquors charged with hydrogen sulphide.[133]

Such sulfur water possesses a remarkable activity, especially with respect to metals, an activity which must have struck its inventors deeply. Not only does it give precipitates or products colored black, yellow, red, etc., with metallic salts and oxides: but the alkaline polysulphides exercise a solvent action on most of the metallic sulphides; they directly color the surface of metals with special shades; finally they can even, by a dry process indeed, dissolve gold.

In these processes of diplosis and in most of the manufactures of asem, the author always adds to the mixture a certain amount of pre-existing asem, to facilitate the operation. There is here an idea analogous to that of a ferment and which is exposed in a more explicit way in two special articles (7) and (60).

A few words now on black asem, a preparation similar to our oxidized silver (36). It is an alloy blackened by metal sulphides. Pliny says the same Hist. nat., XXXIII, 46):

“Egypt colors silver, to see its Anubis in the vases; she paints the silver, instead of chiselling it. This matter passed from there to triumphal statues; and, strange to say, it increases in price by veiling its brilliance. p.70 This is how it works. One mixes with a third of silver two parts of very fine Cyprus copper, called coronary, and as much lively sulfur as silver. We combine the whole thing by fusion, in an earthen vase lute with clay... We also blacken with a hardened egg yolk; but this last tint is removed by the use of chalk and vinegar. »

Thus Pline operates with pure silver, while the papyrus implements a lead alloy.

IV. — Receipts of Pseudo-Democritus.
To complete the characterization of these colorings of metals in gold and silver, as well as the entire industry of Egyptian goldsmiths and metallurgists which gave birth to Alchemy, it seems useful to give the recipes of the first alchemists themselves. I have already reproduced some of them (p. 59, 61, 62, 64, 65, 67). The oldest of these recipes are expounded in the Treatise of Pseudo-Democritus, entitled Physica et Mystica; I studied them and I succeeded in drawing from them a positive meaning, almost as clear as for the processes described by Pliny or Dioscorides. Now their comparison provides the most interesting results.

After a technical fragment on purple dyeing and an evocative narrative, this Treatise continues with two Chapters, one on Chrysopoeia or the art of making gold; the other on the making of asèm, likened to the art of making money. These two Chapters are in fact collections of recipes having the same practical character, that is to say relating both to the preparation of surface-dyed metals and to that of gold and silver alloys. The recipes themselves are comparable in all respects to those of the Leide papyrus, except that each of them ends with the mystical refrains: Nature triumphs over nature; nature enjoys nature; nature dominates nature, etc. However, there is neither magic nor mystery in the very body of the recipes. Let us summarize it in a few lines.

Art of making gold. — First recipe. — Mercury is extinguished by alloying it with another metal; or else by uniting it with sulphur, or with sulphide p.71 of arsenic; or by associating it with certain earthy materials. This paste is spread on copper to whiten it. By adding electrum or powdered gold, a gold colored metal is obtained. Alternatively, the copper is bleached using arsenic compounds, or decomposed cinnabar. It is therefore, in short, a process of apparent silvering of the copper, preceding a superficial gilding.

Second recipe. — Natural sulphide of silver is treated with lead litharge, or with antimony, so as to obtain an alloy; and colored yellow with an undefined material.

Third recipe. — The cuprous pyrite is roasted, it is digested with solutions of sea salt, and an alloy is prepared with silver or gold.

Claudianon (an alloy of copper, tin and lead with zinc) is yellowed by sulfur or arsenic, then alloyed with silver or gold.

Fourth recipe. — Cinnabar, decomposed by various treatments, tints silver into gold, copper into electrum.

Fifth recipe. — A golden yellow varnish is prepared with cadmium, or calf's bile, or turpentine, or castor oil, or egg yolk (vp 56, 58, 59).

Sixth recipe. — Silver is dyed into gold, by a superficial sulphurization, obtained by means of certain pyrites, or oxidized antimony, joined to sulfur water (polysulphide of calcium) and to sulfur itself.

Seventh recipe. - We first prepare an alloy of copper and lead (molybdochalcum) and yellow it, so as to obtain a gold-colored metal.

Eighth recipe. — Copper and silver on the surface are dyed yellow, by means of altered green rosacea. Then comes a recipe for refining gold, reminiscent of royal cement.

Ninth recipe. — Same recipe applied to superficial cementation, which gives the exterior parts of the metal the characteristics of gold.

Comes after a small declamation of the author on the chemical phenomena and on the nature of his science; then three recipes for varnish, to dye gold by digestion with certain mixtures of vegetable substances, saffron, celandine, safflower, etc., recipes which recall the process taken from the Manuel Roret, which I explained above (p. 60) . The author finally says: “This matter of Chrysopeia accomplished by natural operations is that of Pammenes, which he taught to the priests in Egypt. »

Art of making asem. — He then explains the making of asem, or Argyropée (that is to say, the art of making money).

First recipe — The copper is bleached by the volatile compounds of arsenic; this action operated by sublimation being likened to that of mercury.[134]

Second recipe. — Sublimated mercury is quenched with tin, sulfur, and various other ingredients; and it is used to whiten metals.

Third recipe. — Analogous to the preceding and applied to an alloy of copper, orichalcum and tin.

Fourth recipe. — Sulphide of arsenic and sulfur employed for bleaching and modifying metals.

Fifth recipe. — Preparation of a white alloy based on lead.

Sixth recipe. — It is a simple superficial varnish to give copper, lead, iron the appearance of silver; this varnish being fixed by decoction and coated without the action of fire (vp 52).

Seventh recipe. — It represents a dye by amalgamation, and the 8th recipe a simple varnish.

We see that all these recipes of Pseudo-Democritus and Olympiodorus, as well as those of the Leide papyrus, are real, positive, without admixture of chimera. Later came the philosophers and commentators, foreign to the practice and animated by mystical hopes, who threw great confusion into the question. But the starting point is much clearer, as the texts I have just analyzed show.

I thought it useful to develop this study of asem, because it is new and because it throws a lot of light on the ideas of the Egyptians of the third century of our era, relative to the constitution of metals. We see in fact that there are no less than twelve or thirteen distinct alloys, designated by the same name of asèm, alloys containing gold, silver, copper, tin, lead , zinc, arsenic. Their common characteristic was to form the transition between gold and silver, in the manufacture of goldsmith's objects. Nothing was more propitious than such confusion to facilitate fraud: so it had to be carefully maintained by the operators. But, by an easy to conceive return, it passed from the products treated in the operations to the minds of the operators themselves. The theories of the philosophical schools on the first matter, identical in all bodies, but receiving its present form from the addition of the fundamental qualities expressed by the four elements, have encouraged and excited this confusion. This is how workers accustomed to composing alloys simulating gold and silver, sometimes with such perfection that they themselves were mistaken, ended up believing in the possibility of actually manufacturing these metals of all kinds. parts, with the help of certain combinations of alloys, and certain knacks, supplemented by the help of supernatural powers, sovereign mistresses of all transformations. but receiving its present form from the addition of the fundamental qualities expressed by the four elements, have encouraged and excited this confusion. This is how workers accustomed to composing alloys simulating gold and silver, sometimes with such perfection that they themselves were mistaken, ended up believing in the possibility of actually manufacturing these metals of all kinds. parts, with the help of certain combinations of alloys, and certain knacks, supplemented by the help of supernatural powers, sovereign mistresses of all transformations. but receiving its present form from the addition of the fundamental qualities expressed by the four elements, have encouraged and excited this confusion. This is how workers accustomed to composing alloys simulating gold and silver, sometimes with such perfection that they themselves were mistaken, ended up believing in the possibility of actually manufacturing these metals of all kinds. parts, with the help of certain combinations of alloys, and certain knacks, supplemented by the help of supernatural powers, sovereign mistresses of all transformations.



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[1] The first volume appeared in 1843.

[2] See my book Origins of Alchemy, p. 72. 1885.

[3] Origins of Alchemy, p. 211.

[4] Volume XVIII, 2nd part of Notices and extracts from Manuscripts, etc., published by the Academy of Inscriptions (1866), volume prepared by Letronne, Brunet de Presle and the late Egger.

[5] Published by Parthey, under the patronage of the Berlin Academy.

[6] Origins of Alchemy, p. 331.

[7] Same book, p. 80-94.

[8] See also: Origins of Alchemy, p. 211.

[9] See Alchemical Signs and Notations in this volume.

[10] Papyrus V, col. 8, l. 24; collar. 6, l. 26.

[11] Pap.V, col. 1, l. 21, 25, 30; collar. I. 13; collar. 8, l. 6; collar. 9, l. 20, etc

[12] Col. 5, l. 13; collar. 28. l. 15.

[13] Pap. V, col. 2, 1. 20, 29, etc. — Origins of Alchemy, p. 34.

[14] Origins of Alchemy, p. 62.

[15] Pap. V. col. 6, l. 17.

[16] Pap. V, col. 8, l. 18.

[17] Diosc., Matt. medical, t. II, 193, 207; III, 105; IV, 33, 126, 175.

[18] Ibid., II, 144; IV, 175.

[19] Ibid., II, 144, 207; III, 33, 41.

[20] Ibid., V, 114.

[21] Diosc., Matt. med., I, 9, 25, 120, 134; II, 144, 152, 165, 180, etc.; III, 6, 26, 28, etc.; IV, 4, 23, etc.

[22] However, these popular names are rather intended to create an image. As such, they could have preceded the symbolic nomenclature and suggested its idea.

[23] In Dioscorides, III, 80, it is the name of a plant.

[24] Milk from a black cow, literally, so it seems. (Pap. W, col. 3, l. 43, and col. 4, l. 4.)

[25] Here is the actual text of Papyrus W: “The seven perfumes are the styrax consecrated to Saturn, the malabathrum to Jupiter, the Costus to Mars, the incense to the sun, the Indian nard to Venus, the casia to Hermes, the myrrh to the moon. »

[26] Here is the text of papyrus W: “The seven flowers, according to Manetho (the astrologer, are: common marjoram, lily, lotus, Eriphyllium (buttercup?), narcissus, white violet , the rose.” (Pap. W, col. 1, l. 22.) They are ground in a white mortar 21 days before the ceremony and dried in the shade.

[27] Origins of Alch., p. 30. Diosc. Mast. med.; I, 24.

[28] Papyri grœci, V, col. 6.

[29] The word ἴωσις has four meanings it means:

1° The operation of rust, that is to say the oxidation of a metal;

2° The refining of the metal, which is often connected with the oxidation of the impure metal, the latter tending to eliminate the foreign metals whose oxides are more stable: which is the case of metals alloyed with gold in the nature;

3° Virulence, or possession of a specific active property; such in particular as that which oxidation develops in certain metals; but with a more comprehensive meaning;

4° Finally the coloring in violet. This last meaning, which is found among the alchemists and which sometimes responds to the formation of certain colored derivatives of gold, is not applicable here.

[30] The text bears δριάου, which is meaningless; it is δριμύ that must be read.

[31] Lacunae.

[32] 1 drachma = 6 obols, measure of weight.

[33] Copper ore, such as pyrite.

[34] Product of the alteration of pyrite, which may contain both copper sulphate and basic iron sulphate. Sory is a congener of misy, a similar weathering product, but less rich in copper. (V. Diosc. Mat. med., V, 116-118; Pliny, HN, xxxiv, 30, 31.

[35] Silique = third of the obol, measure of weight.

[36] Variety of rock salt.

[37] The text bears the word ὄζεια. This word is not found in dictionaries and greatly embarrassed Mr. Leemans and Reuvens, who saw in it the name of the Jewish king (or prophet) Hosea. I will attach it to ὄζος, knot or branch. It would correspond to the Latin ramentum, so frequent in Pliny.

[38] Misy represents the product of the slow oxidation of pyrites, containing both copper sulphate and more or less basic iron sulphate. (See above, previous page, note 5).

[39] Pliny's schist signifies an ore divisible into lamellae: it is sometimes alum, sometimes an iron ore congener of hematite (Hist. nat., XXVI, 37).

[40] Matter, Hist. of Gnosticism, t. II, p. 265.

[41] A work of the same title was attributed to Hermès. Κλείς, addressed to Toth, and quoted by Lactantius and by Stobeus.

[42] A work of the same title, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, is quoted by Scaliger, in his edition of Manilius, p. 10. There was question of the seven spells corresponding to the seven planets, namely: οἱ ἑπτά κλῆροι ἐν τῇ Παναρέπῳ Τρισμεγίστου.

Saturn: νέμεσις

Jupiter: νίκη

March: τ῀ολμα

Sun: ἀγαθοδαίμων.

Venus: ἔρως.

Mercury: )ανάγκη

Moon: ἀγαθὴ τύχη.

[43] Origins of Alchemy, p. 55, 123, p. 171.

[44] HN, XXX. 2.

[45] Origins of Alchemy, p. 333.

[46] Matter, Hist. of gnosticism, t. II, p. 365.

[47] See above (p. 16, note 3) the seven κλῆροι, taken from the book Panaretos.

[48] ​​Origins of Alchemy, p. 218.

[49] This is the process used to make gold.

[50] See these various recipes below.

[51] Origins of Alchemy, p. 170.

[52] Papyri grœci, t. II, p. 250. We can compare it to the Grecized name of Menodorus.

[53] The sign of gold is absolutely certain. As for that of money, Mr. Leemans took this sign for a B: ii and rather badly drawn, as the photograph which I have shows it; but the text does not seem to me susceptible of another interpretation. M. Leemans in his notes (t. II, p. 257) also translates it as Luna; but he did not understand that it was a question here of gold and silver.

[54] See the photoengravings that I reproduce later in this volume: Plate I, l. 21; Pl. II, l. 3; Pl. IV, l. 25; Pl. VIII. I. 23.

[55] Ibid., Pl. II, l. 5 right; Pl. IV, l. 21.

[56] Papyri Graeci of Leide, vol. II, p. 199 to 259. — A few months after my work was printed in the Journal des Savants, Dr. W. Pleijte published in Dutch a memoir on Asemos, with a chemical study by Dr. WKJ Schoor, Amsterdam (June 1886; pp. 211-236). It generally confirms my own results.

[57] It is not our magnesia, but the magnetic oxide of iron, or some other black, red (pyrite) or white mineral, coming from the cities or provinces which bore the name of Magnesia (See Pliny, HN, XXXVII , 25.) Among the alchemists the meaning of the word was further extended.

[58] Asèm designated various alloys intended to imitate gold and silver; to see further.

[59] Kind of clay. — Diosc., Matt. med, V. 173. — Pliny, HN, XXXV, 56.

[60] Tin amalgam described in section 5.

[61] Talc or selenite.

[62] Pliny, HN, XXXVI, 28. White and hard stone, assimilated to the marble of Paros.

[63] This word has changed meaning; at the end of the Middle Ages it meant our hydrochloride of ammonia; but originally it applied to a fossil salt which developed by efflorescence, a salt analogous to natron. Pliny, HN, XXXI, 39. We will come back to this in the present work.

[64] See the composition of this product above.

[65] Natural asèm is electrum, an alloy of gold and silver, χρυσὸς λευκός of Herodotus. See Origins of Alchemy, p. 215.

[66] The nature of the metal that provides the trimmings is not indicated, is it silver, or the previous asèm?

[67] Kind of clay soil. See recipe 5.

[68] Is it an asem ore? or rather the clay soil of Samos? Pliny, HN, XXXV, 53, and XXXVI, 40. — Diosc., Mat. med., V. 171, 172.

[69] See Pliny, HN, XXXIV, 20.

[70] On the various varieties of cadmium, see Dioscorides, Materia Medica, V, 84; Pliny, HN, XXXIV, 12.

[71] This word has had several meanings vermilion, minium, iron dioxide red. In Dioscorides, V, iii, it seems to indicate red ochre; for it is indicated as a remedy capable of being taken internally. Likewise in Pliny, H. N., XXXV, 13. Here it would be, it seems, minium, which would provide lead to the alloy.

[72] This is a currency.

[73] Perhaps this is our saltpetre? See Dioscorides, Materia Medica, V, 131. The word aphronitron designated saline efflorescences of very diverse composition.

[74] Roasted arsenic sulphide?

[75] Or rather, until the fondant has somehow been absorbed by the vase, or completely evaporated.

[76] Gold solder. See recipe 31.

[77] This seems to indicate an iron oxide (?).

[78] Gold solder.

[79] On obsidian, Pliny, HN XXXVI, 67.

[80] Not having undergone the action of fire.

[81] Arsenic sulphide.

[82] See Pliny, HN, XIII, 25.

[83] It is not our chalk, but, without a doubt, some clayey earth, playing the role of fondant.

[84] See recipe no. 7.

[85] Plant similar to safflower.

[86] It is probably a natural or artificial arsenic sulphide, intermediate between orpiment and realgar. The very powder of the realgar is then more yellow than the compact mass. Perhaps also it was realgar modified by a beginning of roasting, mode of treatment to which all the minerals used in pharmacy were subjected. (See Dioscorides, Mat. med., passim, and especially V, 120 and 121).

[87] See recipes 1, 24.

[88] Brass or the like.

[89] It is more than doubtful that this is our modern sal ammoniac. Rather, it is a variety of rock salt or soda ash, from the formal texts of Dioscorides, Mat. med., V, 125; and from Pliny, HN, XXXI, 39. Similarly, in the treatise De Mineralibus, attributed to Albert the Great, l. V, tr. I, c. II. In Pseudo-Aristotle, author of the Arab period, Manget, Bibl. chem., t. I, p. 648), it is also a fusible salt, which does not emit smoke. But in Geber, Summa perfectionis, book I, ch. X and Libri investigationis (9th century), as well as in Avicenna (11th century), quoted in the Speculum majus of Vincent de Beauvais (Speculum naturale, l. VIII, 60), the word sal ammoniac applies to a sublimable body, such as our ammonia hydrochloride. The meaning of this word has changed over time.

[90] Arsenic sulphide, probably partly disaggregated by roasting.

[91] Minium or sanguine.

[92] Or divine water; the Greek word is the same.

[93] The urine of a prepubescent child, παιδὸς ἀφθόρου, was used by the ancients in many recipes, as we see in Dioscorides, in Pliny, in Celsus, etc. It probably acted as a source of alkaline phosphates and ammonia, resulting from the decomposition of urea. But we don't see why any human urine wouldn't have the same effect; unless there is a mystical idea there. Later, the word child having disappeared in the receipts of the copyists, those applied the epithet to the urine; and there is hardly any mention except of uncorrupted urine (ouron ajqorou) in the Greek alchemical works. However, the primitive notion survived throughout the Middle Ages, in a few texts. Thus we read again in Manget's Bibliotheca Chemica, t. I. Preface, penultimate page (1702): “Sal volatile et fixum, ut et spiritus urinoe, sic parantur. Recipe urine puerorum 12 circiter annos natorum, etc. »

[94] Gold is designated here by the sign of the Sun, exactly like that of the alchemists: it is the oldest known example of this notation.

[95] Silver is designated by the lunar crescent, again as with the alchemists.

[96] See footnote 89.

[97] Pyrite ore of copper.

[98] Copper sulphate, or blue enamel, or azurite.

[99] Plant, see Dioscorides, Mat. med., IV, 90 and 91.

[100] Vitriol, produced by the decomposition of certain ores at the orifice of copper mines (Diosc., Mat. medical. V, 117).

[101] Pliny, HN XXXVI, 36. — Dioscorides, Mat. medical, V, 140. This stone was formerly used for dyeing fabrics. It looks like it was some kind of alunite.

[102] Marine grasses and lichens supplying sorrel.

[103] This agrees with Pliny. It is also a parenthesis, the purple coloring applying to the wool. Before that there are two unintelligible words, owing to some transposition by the copyist.

[104] Unidentified plant. (See Diosc., Mat med. III, 17. — Pliny, HN XXII, 34.)

[105] The wine lees acts here by the bitartrate of potash which it contains.

[106] Plant. See Diosc., Mat. med. III, 100. — Pliny, HN XXV, 85.

[107] Is this the same as dissolving quicklime in water?

[108] Diosc., Matt. med. I, 146.

[109] Greenish blue. This recipe is obscure and incomplete.

[110] Variety of copper oxide produced by the wind from the bellows on molten copper. Pliny HN XXXIV, 36.

[111] Hist. nat., XXXIII, 6, ring of iron surrounded by gold; hollow gold blade filled with light material; 52, gold-plated beds, etc. Filled coins, that is to say made up of a core of copper, iron or lead, covered with a sheet of silver or gold, were used in antiquity and even made by the Government, which mingled them in certain proportions with fair money in its issues, from the time of the Roman Republic and also in the Imperial period, what was called miscere monetam: — tingere or inficere monetam, — last applicable expression so. (The Currency in Antiquity, by Fr. Lenormant, I, 221 to 236).

[112] The very name of brass comes from electrum, which had taken on this meaning during the Middle Ages, according to du Cange.

[113] Origins of Alchemy. Metals among the Egyptians, p. 211 and following.

[114] Ibid., p. 238.

[115] Manilius, Latin poet of the 1st century of the Christian era, also speaks of it in a verse whose authenticity was formerly disputed for a priori reasons: - diplosis being reputed to be unknown before the Middle Ages. But the positive knowledge of this operation among the ancients, established by the Leide papyrus, tends to restore the value of Manilius's text. — See Origins of Alchemy, p. 70.

[116] Origins of Alchemy, p. 75.

[117] Dioscorides, Mat. med., V. 104.

[118] Pliny. Hist. Nat., XXXIII, 29.

[119] This word here seems to mean minium (oxide of lead), a sense found in Dioscorides.

[120] Manuscript 299 of Saint Mark (M), f. 185, recto.

[121] Either native sulphur; according to the symbol of the manuscript.

[122] Origins of Alchemy, p. 215.

[123] The title is: Sur la fabrication de l'asèm; while the sign used throughout the text is that of money. (Greek text below, I, xvi.)

[124] This is obviously the previous recipe, probably inscribed in the temple on a stele or column.

[125] Alloy of lead and tin with zinc and copper.

[126] In the language of the Greek alchemists, this word applies not only to our more or less pure alum, but to the arsenious acid, coming from the roasting of sulphides: this meaning is given in the texts in a very explicit.

[127] Quintessence of gold. This word is sometimes synonymous with gold shell, a denomination retained in the language of goldsmiths by the word gold in shells, that is to say powdered gold, the current meaning of which is perhaps not the same as that of the ancients.

[128] Rock salt.

[129] This description corresponds to that of the aludel.

[130] This name therefore applied to arsenious acid.

[131] White flow.

[132] Melting.

[133] On the same divine water; it reads the following passage: uncovering the still, you will hold your nose because of the smell, etc.

[134] Hence the idea of ​​the two mercury, one drawn from cinnabar, the other from arsenic, which is often found among alchemists.