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I » » . ■ * ^■X.i' '

THE

HISTORY

OF

CHEMISTRY.

BY

THOMAS THOMSON, M.D. F.R.S.E.

PROFKSKOK OK rHKMISTRY IN THB UNIVKRSnT OP GLASGOW.

IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I.

LONIiON:

• >

HENJiy COLBURN, AND RICHARO fiENTLEY,;

* -

NEW BURLINGTON STHBET-.. - . .

J 8,30.

11 PREFACE.

from extending this part of the subject to any greater length than I have done, by considering the small quantity of information which could have been gleaned from the reveries of these fanatics or impostors ; I thought it sufl&cient to give a general view of the na- ture of their pursuits : ' but in order to put it in the power of those who feel inclined to prosecute such in- vestigations, I have given a catalogue of the most eminent of the alchy mists and a list of their works, so far as I am acquainted with them./ This catalogue might have been greatly extended. Indeed it would have been possible to have added several hundred names. But I think the works which I have quoted are more than almost any reasonable man would think it worth his while to peruse ; and I can state, from ex- perience, that the information gained by such a perusa will very seldom repay the trouble.

■; • • • • •

I'^he |ccouu!t ,i>f tKe chemical arts, with which th

anCijBiits* jvere acqifainted, is necessarily imperfect

. becatl9e aH artj» aHd trades were held in so much con

texfil^i by IheVA,' thaf they did not think it worth the •• • •

whj'Ie to Diake themselves acc\viaiuted with the pre

cesses. My chief guide has been Pliny, but many of his descriptions are unintelligible, obviously from his ignorance of the processes which he attempts to de- scribe. Thus circumstanced, I thought it better to be short than to waste a great deal of paper, as some have done, in hypothesis and conjecture.

The account of the Chemistry of the Arabians is almost entirely limited to the works of Geber, which I consider to be the first book on Chemistry that ever was published, and to constitute, in every point of view, an exceedingly curious performance. I was much struck with the vast number of facts with which he was acquainted, and which have generally been sup- posed to have been discovered long after his time. I - have, therefore, been at some pains in endeavouring to convey a notion of Geber*s opinions to the readers of this history ; but am not sure that I have succeeded. 1 have generally given his own words, as literally as possible, and, wherever it would answer the purpose, have employed the English translation of 1678.

Paracelsus gave origin to so great a revolution in me- dicine and the sciences connected with it, that it woxAA.

IT PHEFACE.

have been unpardonable not to have attempted to lay his opinions and views before the reader ; but, after pe- rusing several of his most important treatises, I found it almost impossible to form accurate notions on the subject. I have, therefore, endeavoured to state his opinions in his own words as much as possible, that the want of consistency and the mysticism of his opinions may fall upon his own head. Should the reader find any difficulty in understanding the philosophy of Para- celsus, he will be in no worse a situation than every on< has been who has attempted to delineate the opiniom of this most extraordinary man, this prince of quack and impostors. Van Helmont*s merits were of a muc higher kind, and I have endeavoured to do him justice though his weaknesses are so visible that it require much candour and patience to discriminate accurate! between his excellencies and his foibles.

The history of latro-chemistry forms a branch our subject scarcely less extraordinary than Alchyn itself. It might have been extended to a much great length than I have done. The reason why I did e enter into longer details was, that I thought the subje

more intimately con nect«i witli the liistory of metliciin." thau of chemistry : it undoubtedly contributed to tlie improvemenl of chemistry; not, however, by the opinionsor the physiology of the iatro- chemists, but by inducing their contemporaries and successors lo apply themselves to the discovery of chemical medicines.

^KThe Hiatoiyof Chemistry, after atheory of combus- tion had heea introduced by Beccher and Stahl. be- comes much more important, It now shook off the trammels of alchymy, and ventured to claim its station among the physical sciences. I have found it necessary to treat of its progress during the eighteenth century rather succinctly, but 1 hope so as to be easily intelli- gible. This made it necessary to omit die names of many meritorious individuals, who supplied a share of the contributions which the science was continually receiving from all quarters. I have confined myself to those who made the most prominent figure as che- mical discoverers. I had no other choice but to follow this plan, unless I had doubled the size of this little work, which would have rendered it less agreeable and less valuable to the general reader.

VI PREFACE.

With respect to the History of Chemistry during that portion of the nineteenth century which is alreadi past, it was beset with several diffieulties. Many o the individuals, of whose labours I had occasion t< speak^ are still actively engaged in the prosecution o their useful works. Others have but just left th< arena, and their friends and relations still remain t< appreciate their merits. In treating of this branch c the science (by far the most important of all) I hav followed the same plan as in the history of the precedin century. I have found it necessary to omit man names that would undoubtedly have found a place in larger work, but which the limited extent to which was obliged to confine myself, necessarily compelh me to pass over. I have been anxious not to injure tl character of any one, while I have rigidly adhered truth, so far as I was acquainted with it. Should have been so unfortunate as to hurt the feelings of a individual by any remarks of mine in the followi pages, it will give me great pain ; and the only allev tion will be the consciousness of the total absence my part of any malignant intention. To gratify t wishes of every individual may, perhaps, be imp

PREFACE. YU

sible; but I can say, with truth, that my uniform object has been to do justice to the merits of all, so far as my own limited knowledge put it in my power to do.

1

I.

'i

CONTENTS

OP

THE FIRST VOLUME.

Page lutroduetioii ........ 1

CHAPTER I.

Of Alchymy . . . . . ' . . .3

CHAPTER II. Of the chemical knowledge poMened by the Ancients . 40

CHAPTER III. Chemistry of the Arabian! . . . . .110

CHAPTER IV. Of the progress of Chemistry under Paracelsus and his disciples 140

CHAPTER V. Of Van Helmont and the latro- Chemists . . . 179

CHAPTER VI. Of Agrieola and metallargy ...... 219

CHAPTER VII.

Of Glauber, Lemery, and some other chemists of the end of the seventeenth century ...... 226

CHAPTER VIII. Of the attempts to establish a theory in chemistry . 246

CHAPTER IX.

Of the foundation and progress of scientific chemistry in Great Britain 303

^

A

HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

INTRODUCTION.

Chemistry, unlike the other sciences, sprang ori-* ginally from delusion and superstition, and was at iti^ commencement exactly on a level with magic and astrology. Even after it began to be useful to man, by furnishing him with better and more power- ful medicines than the ancient physicians were ac- quainted with, it was long before it could shake off the trammels of alchymy, which hung upon it like a nightmare, cramping and blunting all its energies, and exposing it to the scorn and contempt of the enlightened part of mankind. It was not till about the middle of the eighteenth century that it was able to free itself from these delusions, and to ven- ture abroad in all the native dignity of a useful sci- ence. It was then that its utility and its importance began to attract the attention of the world ; that it drew within its vortex some of the greatest and most active men in every country ; and that it advanced towards perfection with an accelerated pace. The field which it now presents to our view is vast an^ imposing. Its paramount utility is universally ac- knowledged. It has become a necessary port of edw-*

VOL, J. 3

2 iKTaoDUcnoK.

cation. It has contributed as much to the progress of society, and has done as much to augment the com- forts and conveniences of life, and to increase the power and the resources of mankind, as all the other sciences put together.

It is natural to feel a desire to be acquainted with the origin and the progress of such a science ; and to know something of the history and character of those numerous votaries to whom it is indebted for its pro- gress and improvement. The object of this little work is to gratify these laudable wishes, by taking a rapid view of the progress of Chemistry, from its first rude and disgraceful beginnings till it has reached its pre- sent state of importance and dignity. I shall divide the subject into fifteen chapters. In the first I shall treat of Alchymy, which may be considered as the in- auspicious commencement of the science, and which, in fuct, consists of little else than an account of dupes and impostors ; every where so full of fiction and ob^ iourity, that it is a hopeless and almost impossible task to reach the truth. In the second chapter I shall endeavour to point out the few small chemical rillsi which were known to Uie ancients. These I shall fol-« low in their progress, in the succeeding chapters, till at last, augmented by an infinite number of streanui flowing at once from a thousand different quarterii they have swelled to the mighty river, which now flowi on m«kjeatically» wafting wealth and information to th| civilised world.

A

CHAPTER h

or ALCBTMT.

The word ehemistry (xnM<^'« chemeia) first occurs in SuidaSy a Greek writer, who is supposed to have lived in the eleventh century, and to have written his lexicon during the reign of Alexius Comnenus.* Under the word xty/ma in his dictionary we find the following passage:

*^ Chemistry, the preparation of silver and gold. The books on it were sought out by Dioclesian and burnt, on account of the new attempts made by the Egyptians against him. He treated them with cruelty and harshness, as he sought out the books written by the ancients on the chemistry ( Uepi xnv^*^ ) ^^ S^^^ and silver, and burnt them. His object was to pre-* vent the Egyptians from becoming rich by the know- ledge of this art, lest, emboldened by abundance of wealth, they might be induced afterwards to resist the Romans, "t

* The word X9M^'^ is said to occur in several Greek manu- scripts of a much earlier date. But of this, as I have never had •n opportunity of seeing them, I cannot pretend to judge. So much fiction has been introduced into the history of Alchymy, and so many ancient names have been tr«acherously dragged into the service, that we may be allowed to hesitate when no evidence is presented sufficient to satisfy a reasonable num.

t Xiy/Mca, ^ rov apyvpov irett xpvo'ov KolourKtvrf ^9 ra fiifiKM h§pfinnjffa/JL€yos ^ AiOKKijIiayos ^Kawrtp S((i ra vwhfwOwl^

32

4 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

Under the word Aipac, deras (a skin), in the lexicon, occurs the following passage : '* ^pac, the golden fleece, which Jason and the Argonauts (after a voyage through the Black Sea to Colchis) took, together with Medea, daughter of ^tes, the king. But this was not what the poets represent, but a treatise written on skins (^ipfiaac), teaching how gold might be prepared by chemistry. Probably, therefore, it was called by those who lived at that time, golden y on account of its great importance."* ■

From these two passages there can be no doubt that the word chemistTry was known to the Greeks in the ele- venth century ; and that it signified, at that time, the art of making gold and silver. It appears, further, that in Suidas*s opinion, this art was known to the Egyptians in the time of Dioclesian ; that Dioclesian was convinced of its reality ; and that, to put an endL to it, he collected and burnt all the chemical writingft to be found in Egypt. Nay, Suidas aihrms that ^ book, describing the art of making gold, existed at the time of the Argonauts: and that the object of Jason and his followers was to get possession of that invaluable treatise, which the poets disguised unde^ the term golden fieece. ^

The tirst meaning, then, of chemistry, was the art (^ making gold. And this art, in the opinion of Suidas, was understood at least as early as one thcnav

A

d7fSir acoi ra t^ x^/icuis -xfiwrQu kqll apryvpou rots vaAJMm yrypctufiwa &i$\ta 9tcp«i/ri^ra^cvos tKawrtyVpos ro jui9«c«7t vAovlri mtyymluHs tar nff rotauh^s vpoirytM^aQm r«xi^s> f^erfit JjjnjjimTMt •iJ(Kt fti/T^triTriT w^ptowrta rov \oarQV paipuuoLS ay7cufNty.

* rtipai^ TO xf"'^^^'^^^'*'^ S«paf . ^tnp d Ja/rw ^m ti|s toW«I|| ^oXoirinit «rvar rots apyoifaolais 9ls ttip icoKxtlia irapcefwoitmm 4\9fiov^ luu n|y MiyScuw n|ir AItitqv rov ffcuriKtms ^vymr^a T9vlo 99 o6ic &9 «o«|7ucMs f^ptrat- &^Aa Bifi\iotf ^ «» 9^^m yrfpQ^itif^m vtfNrxov A^vs ^wyuf^xrBoi Sm x>Z^«^v jcp^htq^' tteafa

<( atf7M.

or ALCHYMY. 5

sand two hundred and twenty-five years before tke Christian era : for that is the period at which the Ar* gonautic expedition is commonly fixed by chronolo- gists.

Though the lexicon of Suidas be the first printed book in which the word Chemistry occurs, yet it ift said to be found in much earlier tracts, which still continue in manuscript. Thus Scaliger informs us that he perused a Greek manuscript of Zosimus, the! Pan apolite, -written in the fifth century, and deposited in the King of France's library. Olaus Borrichius mentions this manuscript ; but m such terms that it ' is difficult to know whether he had himself read it ; though he seems to insinuate as much.* The title of this manuscript is said to be "A faithful Descrip- tion of the sacred and divine Art of making Gold and Silver, by Zosimus, the Panapolite."t ^^ this treatise, Zosimus distinguishes the art by the name! xnft^f ckemia. From a passage in this manuscript, quoted by Scaliger, and given also by Olaus Borri- chius, it appears that Zosimus carries the antiquity of the art of making gold and silver, much higher than Suidas has ventured to do. The following is a literal translation of this curious passage :

" The sacred Scriptures inform us that there exists a tribe of genii, who make use of women. Hermes mentions this circumstance in his Physics ; and almost every writing (\oyog), whether sacred (^ove/ooc) or apo- crjrphal, states the same thing. The ancient and divine Scriptures inform us, that the angels, captivated by women, taught them all the operations of nature. OSence being taken at this, they remained out of heaven, because they had taught mankind all manner

• Dc Ortayt Progressu Chemise, p. 12. '

•f* ^iuttrtftov Tov iravavoKiTov yyrioia ypa^ftt Trepi rtic Upac, Koi Ottae rtxvfiQ ^ov xp^^ov km apyvpiov voiti^wf, UavavoKiS a city in Egypt.

^ HISTOKT or GHEinSTRY.

of evily and thmgs which could not be advantageous to their souls. The Scriptures inform us that tha giants sprang from these embraces. Chema is the first of their traditions respecting these arts. The book itself they called Chema ; hence the art is called Chstnia,*'

Zosimus is not the only Greek writer on Chemistry. Olaus Borrichius has given us a list, of thirty-eight treatises, which he says exist in the libraries of Rome^ Venice, and Paris : and Dr. Shaw has increased this list to eighty-nine.* But among these we find thd names of Hermes, Isis, Horus, Democritus, Cleopatra^ Porphyry i Plato, &c. — names which undoubtedly have been affixed to the writings of comparatively modem and obscure authors. The style of these authors, as Borrichius informs us, is barbarous. They are chiefly the production of ecclesiastics, who lived between the fifth and twelfth centuries. In these tracts, the art of which they treat is sometimes called chemistry (xnfuta) I sometimes the chemical art (x^fttvruca) l sometimes the holy art ; and the philosophers stone.

It is evident from this, that between the fifth cen- tury and the taking of Constantinople in the fifteenth century, the Greeks believed in the possibility of making gold and silver artificially; and that the art which professed to teach these processes was called by them Chemistry.

These opinions passed from the Greeks to the An^ bians, when, under the califs of the family of Aba»< tides, they began to turn their attention to science, about the beginning of the ninth century ; and whet the enlightened zeal of the Fatimites in Africa, anc the Ommiades in Spain, encouraged the cultivaiioi of the sciences. From Spain they gradually mad their way into the difierent Christian kingdoms of Sn rope. From the eleventh to the sixteenth century, the ai

• Shaw*s iThuislation of Bberhaave's Cliimblvyt t ftt«

OF ALCHTMTi

^H^making gold and silver was cultivated in Germany, ^^Eilly. France, aod England, with considerable assi- duity. The cultivators of it were called Alchymuttt a name obviously derived from the Greek word cAe- mta, but somewhat altered by the Arabians. Many alchymistical tracts were written during that period. A considerable number of them were collected by Laxarus Zetzner, and published at Strasburg In 1602, under the title of " Theatrura Chemicum, prtocipuoi selectorum auctorum tractatus de Chemise et Lapidia Philosophici Antiquitate, veritate, jure, prsestantia, et operationibus coDtinens in gratiam verse Chemieo et Medicinic Chemicte Studiosocum (ut qui ubcrrimam unde optimorum remediorum messem faccre poterunt) COQgeslum et in quatuor partes seu votumina diges- tum." This book contains one hundred and fiva different alchymistical tracts.

In the year 1610 another collection of alchymistical tracts was published at Basil, iu three volumes, under the title of " Axtis Auriferee quam Chemiam vocant vo< lumiua tria." It contains forly-seven different tracts. Id the year 1702 Mangetus published at Geneva two very large folio volumes, under the name of " Bib* liotheca Chemica Curiosa, aeu rerum ad Alchyniiam pertinentlum thesaurus instruct issimus, quo non tan- tum Artis Auriferee ac scriptorum in ea nobiliorum HJstoria traditur; lapidis Veritas Argumentis et £s- gerimeiitis innumeria, immo et Juris Consultorum Ju- fuisevincitur; Termini obscuriores explicantur; Cau- BiflB contra Impostores et Difficulties in Tinctura ■ttvaraali conficienda occurrentea declarantur: verum ..Dam Tractatus omnea Virorum Celebriorum, qui in UagDO sudarunt Elixyre, quique ab ipso Hermete, ut dicttur, Triimegisto, ad nostra usque tempora de Chry- r>j|0{ioeft icripserunt, cum prscipuis suis Commentariig, "^cinno ordine dispositi exhibentur." Tliis Biblio* tea contains one hundred and twenty-two alchy- bUcal UGatises, many of them of considerable length.

8 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

Two additional volumes of the Tlieatrum Chemicnm were afterwards published ; but these I have never had an opportunity of seeing.

From these collections, which exhibit a pretty com- plete view of the writings of the alchymists, a tolerably accurate notion may be formed of their opinions. Bat before attempting to lay open the theories and notions by which the alchymists were guided, it will be proper to state the opinions which were gradually adopted respecting the origin of Alchymy, and the contrivances by which these opinions were supported.

Zosimus, the Panapolite, in a passage quoted above informs us, that the art of making gold and silver was not a human invention; but was communicated to mankind by angels or demons. These angels, he says, fell in love with women, and were induced by their charms to abandon heaven altogether, and take up their abode upon earth. Among other pieces of in- formation which these spiritual beings communicated to their paramours, was the sublime art of Chemistry, or the fabrication of gold and silver.

It is quite unnecessary to refute this extravagant opinion^ obviously founded on a misunderstanding of a passage in the sixth chapter of Genesis. ^' And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were bom unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair ; and they took them wives of all which they chose. — ^There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them ; the same became mighty men, which were of old, men o^ renown."

There is no mention whatever of angels, or of any information on science commimicated by them to mankind.

Nor is it necessary to say much about the opinion advanced by aomei and ra&er countenanced by Olaui

OF ALCHYMT. 9

BorrichhiKy that the art of making gold was the inven- tion of Tubal-cainj whom they represent as the same as VulcanT An the information which we have respecting Tubal-cain, is simply that he was an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron.^ No allusion what- ever is made to gold. And that in these early ages of the world there was no occasion for making gold arti- ficially, we have the same authority for believing. For in the second chapter of Genesis, where the garden of Eden is described, it is said, *^ And a river went out of Eden to water the garden ; and from thence it was parted, and came into four heads : the name of the first is Pison, that is it which encompasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that- land is good: there is bdellium and onyx- stone."

But the most generally-received opinion is, that alchymy originated in Egypt ; and the honour of the invention has been unanimously conferred upon Hermes Trismegistus. He is by some supposed to be the same person with Chanaan, the son of Ham, whose son Mizraim first occupied and peopled Egypt. Plutarch informs us, that Egypt was sometimes called Chemia.f This name is supposed to be derived from Chanaan (fJ^J3); thence it was believed that Cha- naan was the true inventor of alchymy, to which he affixed his own name. Whether the Hermes ('Bp/i^c) of the Greeks was the same person with Chanaan or his son Mizraim, it is impossible at this distance of time to decide ; but to Hermes is assigned the inven- tion of alchymy, or the art of making gold, by almost the unanimous consent of the adepts.

Albertus Magnus informs us, that '' Alexfmder the Great discovered the sepulchre of Hermes, in one of his journeys, full of all treasures, not metallic, but golden, written on a table of zatadi, which others call

• Uwito iv.22» t De bide and Osiride, c. 5.

I

10 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

emerald.'^ This passage occurs in a tract of Albertni de secretu chemicis, which is considered as suppo- sititious. Nothing is said of the source whence the in' formation contained in this passage was drawn : but from the quotations produced by Kriegsmann, i would appear that the existence of this emerald taU was alluded to by Avicenna and other Arabian wnten According to them, a woman called Sarah took i from the hands of the dead body of Hermes, som ages after the flood, in a cave near Hebron. The in scription on it was in the Phoenician language. Th following is a literal translation of this famous inscri{ tion, from the Latin version of Kriegsmann :*

1 . I speak not fictitious things, but what is true ai) most certain.

* There arc two Latin translations of these tables (unless i iire rather to consider them as originals, for no Phoenician tt Oreek original exists). I shsdl insert them both here.

I. — Verba secretorum Hermetis Trismegisti.

1. Verum sine mendacio certum et verissimum.

2. Quod est inferius, est sicut quod est superius, et qnod< luperius est sicut quod est inferius ad perpetranda miracul*') iinius.

3. £t sicut omnes res fuerant ab uno meditatione unius :. i omnes res nate fuerunt ab hac una re adaptatione. ■

4. Pater ejus est Sol, mater ejus Luna, portavit illud tcfl in ventre suo, nutrix ejus terra est.

5. Pater omnis theiesmi totius mundi est hie. :

6. Vis ejus integra est, si versa fuerit in terram.

7. Separabis terram ab igne, subtile a spisso suaviter • magno ingenio.

8. Ascendit a terra in caelum, iterumque descendit in tend et recipit vim superiorum et inferiorum, sic habebii gloci totius mundi. Ideo fugiat a te omnis obscuritas.

9. Hie est totius fortitudinis fortitudo fortii; quia ¥k omnem rem subtilem, omnemque solidam penetrabit.

10. Si6 mundus creatus est.

ll.Hinc adaptationes erunt mirabiles, quamm modtti Ue.

12. Itaque vocatus sum Hermes Trismegistus, habens i partes philosophin totius mundi.

13. Completum est quod dizi de operatione solis. ' <"

OF AIiCHTMT* Jl

3. What it below is like (hat which is above, and what is above is similar to that which is below, to aC"* comi^ish the miracles of one thing.

3. And as all things were produced by the medita« ti6n of one Being, so all things were produced from this one thing by adaptation.

4. Its father is Sol, its mother Luna; the wind carried it in its belly, the earth is its nurse.

5. It is the cause of all perfection throughout the whole world.

6. lU power is perfect, if it be changed into earth.

7. Separate the earth from the fire, the subtile from the gross, acting prudently and with judgment.

8. Ascend with the greatest sagacity from the earth

n. — DeSCKIPTIO AllCANORUM HERifETiS T&ISME0I8TI.

1. Vere boh ficte, certo verissime aio.

2. laferiera httc cum superioribus illis, istaqne cum iis Ticifisim vires sociant, ut producant rem unam omnium mirificissimam.

3. Ac qnemadmodum cnncta educta ex uno fnere verbo Dei unius : sic omn^ quoque res perpetuo ex. hac una re generantur (Uspositione Nature.

4. Patrem ea habet Solem, matrem Lunam : ab aere in utero quasi gestatur, nutritur a terra.

5. Causa omnia perfectionis rerum ea est per unirerum hoe.

6. Ad Bummam ipsa perfectionem ririum perrenit si redierit in hnmum.

7. In partes tribuitehumum ignem passam, attenuans densits^ fern ejus re omnium suavissima.

8. Summa ascende ingenii sagacitate a terra in ccelum, indeque rursum in terram descende, ac vires superiorum inferiorumqud coge in unum : sic potiere gloria totius mundi atque ita abjecUs sortis homo amplins non habere.

9. Isthec jam res ipsa fortitudine fortior existet; corpora ^ulppe tarn tenuia quam solida penetrando subige.

10. Atque sic quidem qusecunque mundus continet creata f uerft.

11. Hinc admtranda evadunt opera, quae ad eundum modum instituantur.

12. Mihi vero ideo nomen Hermetis Trismegisti impositun^ fait, quod trium mondi s&pientie partiund doctor deprehensus ittm.

13. Hso sunt que de chemiciB artis pretftantittimo o|^eif iOns%nsiids ewt dozL

14 HISTORY 01* CHEMISTRY.

to heaven^ and then again descend to the earth, aii( unite together the powers of things superior and thins inferior. Thus you will possess the glory of the who! world ; and all obscurity will fly far away from you.

9. This thing has more fortitude than fortitude it self; because it will overcome every subtile thing, ani penetrate every solid thing.

10. By it this world was formed.

1 1 . Hence proceed wonderful things, which in thi wise were established.

12.* For this reason I am called Hermes Trismerii tus, because I possess three parts of the philosophy < the whole world.

13. What I had to say about the operation of iS is completed.

Such is a literal translation of the celebrated ii scription of Hermes Trismegistus upon the emeral tablet. It is sufficiently obscure to put it in the pow of commentators to affix almost any explanation to that they choose. The two individuals who have d* voted most time to illustrate this tablet, are Krieg mann and Gerard Dorneus, whose commentaries mj be seen in the first volume of Mangetus's Bibliothe Chemica. They both agree that it refers to the m versal medicine, which began to acquire celebn about the time of Paracelsus, or a little earlier.

This exposition, which appears as probable as tt other, betrays the time when this celebrated insca tion seems to have been really written. Had it bj taken out of the hands of the dead body of Hermetl Sarah (obviously intended for the wife of Abraham} is affirmed by Avicenna, it is not possible that Heroo tus, and all the writers of antiquity, both Pagan ft) Christian, should have entirely overlooked it; or hj could Avicenna have learned what was unknown tO]i{ those who lived nearest the time when the discovif va9 suf^sed to have been made ? Had it been d covered in Egypt by Alexander the Great, woultf

. OF ALCHTMY* 13

ive been unknown to Aristotle, and to all the nume* »U8 tribe of writers whom the Alexandrian school pro- need, not one of whom, however, make the least allu- on to it ? In short, it bears all the marks of a forgery f the fifteenth century. And even the tract ascribed > Albertus Ms^us, in which the tablet of Hermes is mentioned, and the discovery related, is probably also forgery; and doubtless a foi^ery of the same in- ividual who fabricated the tablet itself, in order to irow a greater air of probability upon a story which e vrished to palm upon the world as true. His ob- \ct was in some measure accomplished ; for the au- lenticity of the tablet was supported with much zeal y Kriegsmann, and afterwards by Olaus Borrichius.

There is another tract of Hermes Trismegistus, en- tled "Tractatus Aureus de Lapidis PhysiciSecreto;" a which no less elaborate commentaries have been Titten. It professes to teach the process of making le philosophers stone ; and, from the allusions in it, ) the use of this stone, as a universal medicine, was robably a forgery of the same date as the emerald iblet. It would be in vain to attempt to extract any ling intelligible out of this Tractatus Aureus : it may e worth while to give a single specimen, that the reader lay be able to form some idea of the nature of the style.

" Take of moisture an ounce and a half; of meri- ional redness, that is the soul of the sun, a fourth art, that is half an ounce ; of yellow seyr, likewise alf an ounce ; and of auripigmentum, a half ounce, laking in all three ounces. Know that the vine of ise men is extracted in threes, and its wine at last is 3mpleted in thirty."*

* '' Accipe de liumore unciam unam et mediam, et de rubore eridionali, id est anima solis, quartam partem, id est, un» am mediam, et de Seyre citrino, similiter unciam mediam, ; de anripigmenti dimidium, quae sant octo, id est uncise tres. ntote quod vitis sapientum in tribus extrahitur, ejusque^rinum fia« tng^nta peragitur*'*^

14 HISTOftT or CHEMIftTRT.

Had t&e opinion, that gold and silver could be aiw tificially formed originated with Hermes Trismegistui, or had it prevailed among the ancient Egyptians^ it would certainly have been alluded to by Herodotus, who spent so many years in Egypt, and was instructed by the priests in all the science of the Egyptians. Had chemistry been the name of a science, real or ficti- ttous, which existed as early as the expedition of tha Argonauts, and had so many treatises on it, as Suidai alleges existed In Egypt before the reign of Dioclesian, it could hardly have escaped the notice of Pliny, who was so curious and so indefatigable in his researches, and who has collected in his natural history a kind of digest of all the knowledge of the ancients in every department of practical science. The fiact that the term chemistry (xiififto) never occurs in any Greek or Roman writer prior to Suidas, who wrote so late as th€ elevendi century, seems to overturn all idea of thf existence of that pretended science among the an- cients, notwithstanding the elaborate attempts o: Olaus Borrichius to prove the contrary.

I am disposed to believe, that chemistry or alchymy understanding by the term the art of making goU and silver, originated among the Arabians, whei they began to turn their attention to medicine, aftc the establishment of the caliphs ; or if it had previ ously been cultivated by Greeks (as the writings i Zosimus, the Panapolite, if genuine, would lead us t suppose), that it was taken up by the Arabians, an reduced by them into regular form and orde If the works of Geber be genuine, they leave litt doubt on this point. Geber is supposed to have bei a physician, and to have written in the seventh ce: tury. He admits, as a first principle, that metals a compounds of mercury and sulphur. He talks of t philosopher's stone ; professes to give the mode of pi paring it; and teaches the way of converting t different xnetals; known in his time, into medicinesi

or ALCHTMT. 15

wbme efficacy he bestowt the most ample panegyrics* ThuB the principles which lie at the bottom of alchymy were implicitly adopted by him. Yet I can nowhere find in him any attempt to make gold artificially. His ehemistiy was entirely devoted to the improvement of medicine.. The subsequent pretensions of the alchy- milts to convert the baser metals into gold are no where avowed by him. I am disposed from this to suipecty that the theory of gold-making was started aftor Qeber's time, or at least that it was aftecJthe Hgrenth centory, before any alchymist ventured to imSrm that he himself was in possession of the secret, and could fabricate gold artificially at pleasure. For there is a wide distance between the opinion that gold may be made artificially and the affirmation that we are in possession of a method by which this transmu* tation of the baser metals into gold can be accom- plished. The first nray be adopted and defended with much plausibility and perfect honesty ; but the second would require a degree of skill far exceeding that of the most scientific votary of chemistry at present existing.

The opinion of the alchymists was, that all the me-* tals are compounds; that the baser metals contain the same constituents as gold, contaminated, indeed , with various impurities, but capable, when their im.- purities are removed or remedied, of assuming all the properties and characters of gold. The substance possessing this wonderful power they distinguish by the name of Iqpi&^philosopkorum, or, philosopher's stone, and they usually describe it as a red powder, havinff a peculiar smell. Few of the alchymists who have left writings behind them boast of being pos- •ened of the philosopher's stone. Paracelsus, indeed, affirms, that he was acquainted with the method of making it, and gives several processes, which, how- ertTy wte not intdlligible. But many affirm that they

16 HISTORY OP CHEMISTRY.

had seen tbe philosopher's stone ; that they had poir-' tions of it in their possession ; and that they had seen several of the inferior metals, especially lead and quicksilver, converted by means of it into gold. Many stories of this kind are upon record, and so well au- thenticated, that we need not be surprised at th^ having been generally credited. It will be sufficient if we state one or two of those which depend upon the most unexceptionable evidence. The following relation is given by Mangetus, on the authority of M. Gros, a clergyman of Greneva, of the most un- exceptionable character, and at the same time a skil^ ful physician and expert chemist :

About the year 1650 an unknown Italian came to Geneva, and took lodgings at the sigif of the Cfreen Cross. After remaining there a day or two, he re- quested De Luc, the landlord, to procure him a man acquainted with Italian, to accompany him through the town and point out those things which deserved t< be examined. De Luc was acquainted with M. Gros at that time about twenty years of age, and a studen in Geneva, and knowing his proficiency in the Italiai language, requested him to accompany the strangei To this proposition he willingly acceded, and attende the Italian every where for the space of a fortnigh The stranger now began to complain of wantof mone; which alarmed M. Gros not a little — for at thj time he was very poor — and he became apprehensiv from the tenour of the stranger's conversation, that I intended to ask the loan of money from him. B instead of this, the Italian asked him if he was a quainted with any goldsmith, whose bellows and ott utensils they might be permitted to use, and w would not refuse to supply them with the difierc articles requisite for a particular process which wanted to perform. M. Gros named a M. Bureau, "^hom the Italian immediately repaired. He read

OF ALCHTMY. 17

fiimished crucibles, pure tin, quicksilver, and the other things required by the Italian. The goldsmith left his workshop, that the Italian might be under the less restraint, leaving M. Gros, with one of his own workmen, asi an attendant. The Italian put a quantity of tin into one crucible, and a quantity of quicksilver into another. The tin was melted in the fire and the mercury .heated. It was then poured into the melted tin, and at the same time a red powder enclosed in wax was projected into the amalgam. An agitation took place, and a great deal of smoke was exhaled from the crucible; but this speedily subsided, and the whole being poured out, formed six heavy ingots, having the colour of gold. The goldsmith was called in by the Italian, and requested to make a rigid exa- mination of the smallest of these ingots. The gold- smith, not content with the touchstone and the appli- cation of aqua fortis, exposed the metal on the cupel with lead, and fused it with antimony, but it sus- tained no loss. He found it possessed of the ducti- lity and specific gravity of gold ; and full of admira- tion, he exclaimed that he had never worked before upon gold so perfectly pure. The Italian made him a present of the smallest ingot as a recompence, and then, accompanied by M. Gros, he repaired to the Mint, where he received from M. Bacuet, the mint- master, a quantity of Spanish gold coin, equal in weight to the ingots which he had brought. To M. Gros he made a present of twenty pieces, on account of the attention that he had paid to him ; and, after paying his bill at the inn, he added fifteen pieces more, to serve to entertain M. Gros and M. Bureau for some days, and in the mean time he ordered a supper, that he might, on his return, have the plea- sure of supping with these two gentlemen. He went out, but never returned, leaving behind him the greatest regret and admiration. It is needless to add, that M. Gros and M. Bureau continued tx) eiv^o^

YOZ, I. c

I

r

HISTORY OP CHEMISTKT.

themselves at the ina tilt the fifteen pieces, which tJ Blranger had left, were exhausted."*

Mangetus gives also the following relation, which h^H states upon the authority of aa English bishop, whol communicated it to him in the year 1635, aad at thfi same time gave him about half an ounce of the gold which the alchymist had made : ^

A stranger, meanly dressed, went to Mr. Boyle, aii<ij after coDversing for some time about chemical pro cesses, requested him to furnish him with antimonyjl and some other common metallic substances, whicfaf then fortunately happened to be in Mr. Boyle's la latory. These were put into a crucible, which i then placed in a melting-furnace. As soon as thea metals were fused, the stranger showed a powder attendants, which he projected into the crucible, aDtU instantly went out, directing the servants to allow tl crucible to remain in the furnace till the fire went o' of its own accord, and promising at the same time t4 return in a few hours. But, as he never fulfilled thi^ promise, Boyle ordered the cover to be taken off tht crucible, and found that it contained a yellow-coloure| metal, possessing all the properties of pure gold, and only a little lighter than the weight of the materiali originally put into the crucible. f

The following strange story is related by Helvetius physician to the Prince of Orange, in hisVitulusAuretw Helvetius was a disbeliever of the philosopher's stone and the universal medicine, and even turned Si Kenelm Digby's sympathetic powder into ridicule On the 27th of December, 1666, a stranger caJla upon him, and after conversing for some time about universal medicine, showed a yellow powder, which I affirmed to be the philosopher's stone, and at the san time five large plates of gold, which had been mat

or ALCHTMY. 19

by means of it. Helvetius earnestly entreated that he would give him a little of this powder, or at least that he would make a trial of its power ; but the stranger refbsedy promising however to return in six weeks. He returned accordingly, and after much entreaty he gave to Helvetius a piece of the stone, not larger than the size of a rape-seed. When Helvetius expressed his doubt whether so small a portion would be sufficient to convert four grains of lead into gold, the adept broke off one half of it, and assured him that what remained was more than sufficient for the purpose. Helvetius, during the first conference, had concealed a little of the stone below his nail. This he threw into melted lead, but it was almost all driven off in smoke, leaving only a vitreous earth. When he mentioned this circumstance, the stranger informed him that the powder must be enclosed in wax, before it be thrown into the melted lead, lest it should be injured by the smoke of the lead. The stranger promised to return next day, and show him the method of making the projection ; but having failed to make his appearance, Helvetius, in the presence of his wife and son, put six drachms of lead into a crucible, and as soon as it was melted he threw into it the fragment of philosopher's stone in his possession, previously covered over with wax. The crucible was now covered with its lid, and left for a quarter of an hour in the fire, at the end of which time he found the whole lead converted into gold. The colour was at first a deep green ; being poured into a conical vessel, it assumed a blood-red colour; but when cold, it acquired the true tint of gold. Being examined by a goldsmith, he considered it as pure gold. He requested Porelius, who had the charge of the Dutch mint, to try its value. Two drachms of it being subjected to quartation, and solu- tion in aqua fortis, were found to have increased in weight by two scruples. This increase was doubtless owing to the silver, which still remained enveloped in

c 2

20 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

the goldy after the action of the aqua fortis. To en- deavour to separate the silver more completely, the gold was again fused with seven times its weight of antimony, and treated in the usual manner; but no alteration took place in the weight.*

It would be easy to relate many other similar nar- ratives ; but the three which I have given are the best authenticated of any that I am acquainted with. The reader will observe, that they are all stated on the authority, not of the persons who were the actors, but of others to whom they related them ; and some of these, as the English bishop, perhaps not very familiar with chemical processes, and therefore liable to leave out or mistate some essential particulars. The evi- dence, therefore, though, the best that can be got, is not sufficient to authenticate these wonderful stories. A little latent vanity might easily induce the narrators to suppress or alter some particulars, which, if known, would have stripped the statements of every tiling mar- vellous which they contain, and let us into the secret of the origin of the gold, which these alchymists boasted that they had fabricated. Whoever will read the statements of Paracelsus, respecting his knowledge of the philosopher's stone, which he applied not to the formation of gold but to medicine, or whoever will examine his formulas for making the stone, will easil] satisfy himself that Paracelsus possessed no real know- ledge on the subject.f

But to convey as precise ideas on this subject ai possible, it may be worth while ta state a few of thi methods by which the alchymists persuaded themselve that they could convert the baser metals into gold.

In the year 1694 an old gentleman called upoi Mr. Wilson, at that time a chemist in London, bxu informed him that at last, after forty years' seatch, h

* Bergmann, Opusc. ir. 121.

t I allude to his Manuals sive de Lapide PhUosophico Medie\ »a/g. Opera ParaceJsi, ii. 133. Folio edition. Geneva, 1Q58.

OF ALCHYMV. 21

had met with an ample recompence for all his trouble and expenses. This he confirmed with some oaths and imprecations ; but, considering his great weakness and age, he looked upon himself as incapable to un- dergo the fatigues of the process. " I have here," says he, " a piece of sol (gold) that I made from silver, about four years ago, and I cannot trust any man but you with so rare a secret. We will share equally the charges and profit, which will render us wealthy enough to command the world." The nature of the process being stated, Mr. Wilson thought it not unreasonable, especially as he aimed at no peculiar advantage for himself. He accordingly put it to the trial in the following manner:

1 . Twelve ounces of Japan copper were beat into thin plates, and laid stratum super stratum with thi'ee ounces of flowers of sulphur, in a crucible. It was exposed in a melting-furnace to a gentle heat, till the sulphureous flames expired. When cold, the «es ustum (sulphuret of copper) was pounded, and stratified again ; and this process was repeated fi^Q times. Mr. Wilson does not inform us whether the powder was mixed with flowers of sulphur every time that it was heated ; but this must have been the case, otherwise the sul-. phuret would have been again converted into metallic copper, which would have melted into a mass. By this first process, then, bisulphuret of copper was formed, composed of equal weights of sulphur and copper.

2. Six pounds .of iron wire were put into a large glass body, and twdve pounds of muriatic acid poured upon it. Six days elapsed (during which it stood in a gentle heat) before the acid was saturated with the iron. The solution was then decanted off, and filtered, and six pounds of new muriatic acid poured on the undissolved iron. This acid, after standing a sufficient time, was decanted off, and filtered. Both liquids were ppt into a large retort, and distilled by a sand- heat. Towards the end, when the drops fcoia l\ift

Hi HISTORY OP CHEMISTRY.

new vinegax; agitate again, and continue these re^ peated agitations and additions till the vinegar ceases to acquire a black colour from the mercury : the mer cury is now quite pure and very brilliant.

4. Take of this mercury four parts; of sublimed mercury* {mercuHi meteoresati), prepared with your own hands, eight parts; triturate them together in a wooden mortar with a wooden pestle, till all the grains of running mercury disappear. This process is tedious and rather difficult.

4. The mixture thus prepared is to be put into an aludel, or a sand-bath, and exposed to a subliming heat, which is to be gradually raised till the whole sublimes. Collect the sublimed matter, put it again into the aludel, and sublime a second time ; this pro- cess must be repeated five times. Thus a very sweet and crystallized sublimate is obtained : it constitutes the salt of wise men {sal sapientum), and possesses^ wonderful properties. f ^

5. Grind it in a wooden mortar, and reduce it tb^ powder ; put it into a glass retort, and pour upon it the spirit of wine (No. 1) till it stands about three-* finger-breadths above the powder ; seal the retoit^ hermetically, and expose it to a very gentle heat fot( seventy- four hours, shaking it several times a-dayj' then distil with a gentle heat and the spirit of win^ will pass over, together with spirit of mercury. Ket this liquid in a well-stopped bottle, lest it shoi evaporate. More spirit of wine is to be poured ii| the residual salt, and after digestion it must be dial tilled off as before ; and this process must be repes till the whole salt is dissolved, and distilled over wi the spirit of wine. You have now performed a work. The mercury is now rendered in some measi volatile, and it will gradually become fit to receive thf tincture of gold and silver. Now return thanks |j|

* Probably connive subUmtte. f Probably ealoihel. ^

OF ALCHTMT. 26

Qody who has hitherto crowned yonr wonderful work with success ; nor is this great work involved in Cim- merian darkness, but clearer than the sun; though preceding writers have imposed upon us with parables, hieroglyphics, fables, and enigmas.

6. Take this mercurial spirit, which contains out magical steel in its belly, put it into a glass retort, to which a receiver must be well and carefully luted: draw off the spirit by a very gentle heat, there will remain in the bottom of the retort the quintessence or soul of mercury ; this is to be sublimed by applying a stronger heat to the retort that it may become volatile, as all the philosophers express themselves —

Si fixum solvas faciesqae volare solutum, £t volncrnm figas faciet te vivere tutnm.

This is our luna, our fountain, in which the king and queen may bathe. Preserve this precious quintessence of mercury, which is very volatile, in a well-shut ves^ «el for further use.

8. Let us now proceed to the operation of common gold, which we shall communicate clearly and dis- tinctly, without digression or obscurity; that from vul- gar gold we may obtain our philosophical gold, just as from common mercury we obtained, by the preceding processes, philosophical mercury.

in the name of God, then, take common gold, pu- rified in the usual way by antimony, convert it into small grains, which must be washed with salt and vine- gar, till it be quite pure. Take one part of this gold, and pour on it three parts of the quintessence of mer- cury ; as philosophers reckon from seven to ten, so we also reckon our number as philosophical, and we begin with three and one ; let them be married together like husband and wife, to produce children of their own kind, and you will see the common gold sink and plainly dissolve. Now the marriage is consummated ; now two things are converted into one ; thus the phi-

26 HISTOET OF CHEanSTUT.

losophical sulphur is at hand, as the philosophers say, the sulphur being dissolved the stone is at hand. Take then, in the name of God, our philosophical ves- sel, in which the king and qteen embrace each other as in a bedchamber, and leave it till the wStter is con- verted into earth, then peace is concluded between the water and fire, then the elements have no longer anything contrary to each other; because, when the elements are converted into earth they no longer op- pose each other ; for in earth all elements are at rest. For the philosophers say, " When you shall hav6 seen the water coagulate itself, think that your knowledge is true, and that your operations are truely philoso* phical." The gold is now no longer common, but ours is philosophical, on account of our processes : a1 first exceedingly fixed ; then exceedingly volatile, anc finally exceedingly fixed ; and the whole science de pends upon the change of the elements. The gold a first was a metal, now it is a sulphur, capable of cod verting all metals into its own sulphur. Now oo tincture is wholly converted into sulphur, which pof sesses the energy of curing all diseases : this is oc universal medicine against all the most deplorab diseases of the human body ; therefore, return infinr thanks to Almighty God for all the good things whk he has bestowed upon us.

9. In this great work of ours, two modes of U menting and projecting are wanting, without whidi t uninitiated will not easily follow our process. T mode of fermenting is as follows : Take of our sulpl) above described one part, and project it upon ^ parts of very pure gold fused in a furnace ; in a b ment you will see the gold, by the force of the sulpb converted into a red sulphur of an inferior quality the first sulphur ; take one part of this, and projec upon three parts of fused gold, the whole will be ag converted into a sulphur, or a friable mass; mix one partofthiswiththreepartoof gold^ you will li

OF AXCHTKT. " T Vfl

Aindkable and extensible metal. If you find it so, •well ; if not add other sulphur and it will again pass into isulphur. Now the sulphur will be sufficiently ferment- led, or our medicine will be brought into a metallic jas^ure. t: .

IQ. The mode of projecj^ijig is this : Take of tbe fer- .mented sulphur one part, and project it upon ten. parts of mtilreury, heated in a crucible, and you will have a 4terlbct. metal; if its colour is not sufficiently deep, .fttfte;it "again, and add more fermented sulphur, and thusjitjwill acquire colour. If it becomes frangible, add a sufficient quantity of mercury and it will be •perfect.

Thus, friend, you have a description of the universal medicine, not only for curing diseases and prolonging life, but also for transmuting all metals into gold. Give therefore thanks to Almighty God, who, tsiin^ pity on human calamities, has at last revealed this inestimable treasure, and made it known for the com- mon benefit of all.*

Such is the formula (slightly abridged) of Carolus Musitanus, by which the philosopher's stone, according to him, may be formed. Compared with the formulas of most of the alchymists, it is sufficiently plain. What the sublimed mercury is does not appear ; from the process described we should be apt to consider it as corrosive sublimate ; on that supposition, the sal Bapientum formed in No. 5, would be calomel : the only objection to this supposition is the process de- scribed in No. 5; for calomel is not soluble in alcohol. The philosopher's stone prepared by this elaborate process could hardly have been any thing else than an amalgam of gold; it could not have contained chlo- ride of gold, because such a preparation, instead of acting medicinally, would have proved a most virulent poison. There is no doubt that amalgam of gold, if

' • Mangtti Bibllothec« Chemics Pr»&tio.

28 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

projected into melted lead or tin, and afterwards cu- pellated, would leave a portion of gold — all the gold of course that existed previously in the amalgam. It might therefore have been employed by impostors to persuade the ignorant that it was really the philoso- pher's stone; but the alchymists who prepared the amalgam could not be ignorant that it contained gold.

There is another process given in the same preface of a very different nature, but too long to be tran- scribed here, and the nature of the process is not suf- ficiently intelligible to render an account of it of much consequence.*

The preceding obseiTations will give the reader some notion of the nature of the pursuits which occupied the alchymists : their sole object was the preparation of la substance to which they gave the name of the philoso- pher's stone, which possessed the double property oj converting the baser metals into gold, and of curing al^ diseases, and of preserving human life to an indefinite extent. The experiments of Wilson, and the formulj of Musitanus, which have .been just inserted, will givi the reader some notion of the way in which they at tempted to manufacture this most precious substance Being quite ignorant of the properties of bodies, an of their action on each other, their processes wei guided by no scientific analogies, and one part of tl labour not unfrequently counteracted another; itwoul be a waste of time, therefore, to attempt to analyze the numerous processes, even though such an attem' could be attended with success. But in most cas^ from the unintelligible terms in which their books a

* Whoever wishes to enter more particularly into the pi cesses for making the philosopher's stone contrived by the chymists, will find a good deal of information on the subject Stahl's Fundamenta Chemiss, vol. i. p. 219, in his chapter lapide philosophorum : and Junker's Conspectus Chemise, i i. p. 604, in his tabula 28, De transmutatione metallorum nmt tali/ and. tabula 29, De transmutatione metaUonOn particut

OP ALCHYMT. / 29.

written, it is impossible to divine the nature of the processes by which they endeavoured to manufacture the philosopher*s stone, or the nature of the sub- stances which they obtained.*

In consequence of the universality of the opinion that gold could be made by art, there was a set of impostors who went about pretending that they were in possession of the philosopher's stone, and offering to communicate the secret of making it for a suit- able reward. Nothing is more astonishing than that persons should be found credulous enough to be the dupes of such impostors. The very circumstance of their claiming a reward was a sufficient proof that they were ignorant of the secret which they pretended to reveal ; for what motive could a man have for ask- ing a reward who was in possession of a method of creating gold at pleasure? To such a person money could be no object, as he could procure it in any quantity. Yet, strange as it may appear, they met with abundance of dupes credulous enough to believe their asseverations, and to supply them with money to enable them to perform the wished-for processes. The object of these impostors was either to pocket the money thus furnished, or they made use of it to pur- chase various substances from which they extracted oils, acids, or similar products, which they were enabled to sell at a profit. To keep the dupes, who thus supplied them with the means of carrying on these processes, in good spirits, it was necessary to show them occasionally small quantities of the baser metals converted into gold ; this they performed in various ways. M. Geoffroy, senior, who had an op- portunity of witnessing many of their performances,

• Kircher, in his Mundus Subterraneus, has an article on the philosopher's stone, in which he examines the processes of the Schymists, points out their absurdity, and proves by irrefrag- able arg:unients that no such substance had ever been obtained. Those who are curious about alcbymistical processes may con- sult that work.

30 ' HISTOET OF CHEMISTRY.

has given us an account of a number of their tricks* It may be worth while to state a few by way of specimen.

Sometimes tliey made use of crucibles with a falser bottom ; at the real bottom they put a quantity of oxide of gold or silver, this was covered with a portion of powdered crucible ^ glued together by a littler- gummed water or a little wax ; the materials being put mto this crucible, and heat applied, the false bottom: disappears, the oxide«of gold or silver is reduced, and at the end of the:pcocess is found at the bottom of the crucible, and considered as the product of the operation.

Sometimes they make a hole in a piece of charcoal: and fill it with oxide of gold or silver, and stop up the mouth with a little wax; or they soak charcoal iir solutions of these metals ; or they stir the mixtures im the crucible with hollow rods containing oxide of gold or silver within, and the bottom shut with wax : by theaa means the gold or silver wanted is introduced during th« process, and considered as a product of the operation,

Sometimes they have a solution of silver in nitric acid, or of gold in aqua regia, or an amalgam of goW or silver, which being adroitly introduced, fomishei the requisite quantity of metal. A common exhibitioi was to dip nails into a liquid, and take them out half con verted into gold. The nails consisted of one-half gold neatly soldered to the iron, and covered with somethin to conceal the colour, which the liquid removec Sometimes they had metals one-half gold the oth< half silver, soldered together, and the gold side whitenc with mercury ; the gold half was dipped into the tran muting liquid and then the metal heated ; the merctt was dissipated, and the gold half of the metal a; peared.*

As the alchymists were assiduous workmen — as th mixed all the metals, salts, &;c. with which they w

• Afem. Paris, 1722, p. 61.

•cqntiinted, in t^ohs ways with each other, and sub- jected such mixtures to the action of heat in close TCflsels, their labours were occasionally repaid by the discovery of new substances, possessed of much ^ater ftctivity than any with which they were previously Bcquain^. In this way they were led to the dis- , covery of sulphuric, nitric, and muriatic acids. These, when known, were made to act upon the metals ; aolu- Uons of the metals were obtained, and this gradually ' led to the knowledge of various metalline salts and ' preparations, which were introduced with considerable ' advantage into medicine. Thus the alchymists, by J their absurd pursuits, gradually formed a collection of I facts, which led ultimately to the establishment of scientific chemistry. On this account it will be proper to notice, in this place, such of them as appeared in £urope during the darker ages, and acquired the . highest reputation either on account of their skill as physicians, or their celebrity as chemists. *

1. The first alchymist who deserves notice is Alber- tus Magnus, or Albert Groot, a German, who was bom, it is supposed, in the year 1193, at BoUstaedt, and died in the year 1282. f When very young he is said to have been so remarkable for his dulness, that he became the jest of his acquaintances. He studied the sciences at Padua, and afterwards taught at Cologne, and finally in Paris. He travelled through all Germany as Provincial of the order of Dominican Mottks, vbited Rome, and was made bishop of Katis- bon : but his passion for science induced him to give

Iup bis bisliopric, and return to a cloister at Cologne, iRicre he continued till his death. Albertus was acquainted with all the sciences cul- • The orifinftl author, whom all wlio huve given any account of the alchymists have rollowed, is Olaus Borrichins, in his Con^etiu Kcriptetmm Chemicorum Celebriomm. He doe: ' ' ' ' ' £ his information was derived.

32. HISTORY or CHEMISTRY.

tivated m. his time. He. was at once a theolog^y '.4 physician, and a man of the world : he was an astro nomer and an alchymist, and even dipped into magi^ and necromancy. His works are very volaminous They were collected by Petr. Jammy, and publiihaii at lieyden in twenty-one folio volumes, in 16^* IfM principal alchy mistical tracts are the following :

1 . De Rebus Metallicis et Mineralibus.

2. De Alchymia.

3. Secretorum Tractatus.

4. Breve Compendium de Ortu Metallorum. •

5. Concordantia Philosophorum de Lapide.

6. Compositum de Compositis.

7 Liber octo Capitum de Philosophorum Lapide*. -.

Most of these tracts have been inserted in ^ Theatrum Chemicum. They are in general plain aiit intelligible. In his treatise De Alchymia, for exampki he gives a distinct account of all the chemical sob* stances known in his time, and of the manner o( obtaining them. He mentions also the apparatus thea employed by chemists, and the various processes whidi they had occasion to perform. I may notice the mfli remarkable facts and opiiiions which I have obserytfl in turning over these treatises. '9

He was of opinion that all metals are composed'| sulphur and mercury; and endeavoured to accoiit for the diversity of metals partly by the difference^ the purity, and partly by the difference in the propM tions of the sulphur and mercury of which they il composed. He thought that water existed also atf constituent of all metals.

He was acquainted with the water-bath, emplojl sdembics for distillation, and aludels for sublimatiii and he was in the habit of employing various Intj the composition of which he describes. li

He mentions alum and caustic alkali, and aeci to have known the alkaline basis of cream of tait He knew the method of purifybg the precious jmt

OT ALCHTMT. 33

l^i&cansof lead and of gold, by cementation; and ''(^ise the method of trying the purity of gold, and ^ dktinguishing pure from impure gold.

He mentions red lead, metallic arsenic, and Hver of *id{^ur. He was acquainted with green vitriol and ^n p^ites. He knew that arsenic renders copper ^hite, and that sulphur attacks all the metals except X)W. •

It is said by some that he was acquainted with gun- owder ; but nothing indicating any such knowledge ccurs in any of his writings that I have had an oppor- mity of perusing.*

2. Albertus is said to have had for a pupil, while e taught in Paris, the celebrated Thomas Aquinas, a k>minican, who studied at Bologna, Rome, and Faples, and distinguished himself still more in divi- ity and scholastic philosophy than in alchymy. He

rot?,

1. Thesaurum Alchymiee Secretissimum.

2. Secreta Alchymio; Magnalia.

3. De Esse et Essentia Mineralium ;

nd perhaps some other works, which I have not seen.

These works, so far as I have perused them, are xceedingly obscure, and in various places unintelli- gible. Some of the terms still employed by modem ihemists occur, for the first time, in the writings of liomas Aquinas. Thus the term amalgam, still em- iloyed to denote a compound of mercury with another aetal, occurs in them, and I have not observed it in iny earlier author.

3. Soon after Albertus Magnus, flourished Roger 3acon, by far the most illustrious, the best informed, md the most philosophical of all the alchymists. He vas bom in 1214, in the county of Somerset. After itudying in Oxford, and afterwards in Paris, he became i cordelier friar; and, devoting himself to philosophical

* It is curious that Olaus Borrichius omits Albertus Magnus in the list of alchymistical writers that he has given. VOL. I. D

34 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

investigations, hid discoveries, notwithstanding th6 pains which he took to conceal them, made such a noise, that he was accused of magic, and his btethreb in consequence threw him into prison. He died, it is- said, in the year 1284, though Sprengel fixes the year of his death to be 1285.

His writings display a degree of knowledge and extent of thought scarcely credible, if we consider the time when he wrote, the darkest period of the dark ages. In his small treatise De Mirabili Potestate Arti^ et Naturce, he begins by pointing out the absurdity of believing in magic, necromancy, charms, or any of those similar opinions which were at that time universally prevalent. He points out the various ways in which mankind are deceived by jugglers, ventriloquists, &c. ;• mentions the advantages which physicians may derive from acting on the imaginations of their patients by means of charms, amulets, and infallible remedies : he affirms that many of those things which are consi- dered as supernatural, are merely so because mankind in general are unacquainted with natural philosophy. To illustrate this he mentions a great number of natural phenomena, which had been reckoned miraculous ; and concludes with several secrets of his own, which htf affirms to be still more extraordinary imitations of som4r of the most singular processes of nature. These h& delivers in the enigmatical style of the times ; induced,' as he tells us, partly by the conduct of other philoso^' phers, partly by the propriety of the thing, and partljf by the danger of speaking too plainly.

From an attentive perusal of his works, many ci which have been printed, it will be seen that Bacofl was a great linguist, being familiar with Latin, Greek Hebrew, and Arabic; and that he had perused thi most important books at that time existing in all thes languages. He was also a grammarian ; he was w^ versed in the theory and practice of perspective ; h understood the use of conve;!i: and concave glassesi an

lid AJrt of nuking them. The csim^m obicntat bum-' ng-glaMeHy and the powers of the telesc^ope, were iaowh to hhn. He was well versed in geography and kstronomy. He knew the great error in the Jtilian adendaty assigned the cause, and proposed the remedy^ lie understood chronology well ; he was a skilful phy« lieiauy and an able mathematician, logician, ifieta-^ physician^ and theologist ; but it is as a chemist that le claims our attention here. The following is a list )f his chemical writings, as given by Gmehn, thi^ irhole ef which I have never had an opportunity df leeilig: Ik Speculum Alchymise.*

2. Epistola de Secretis Operibus Artis et Natures ^t le NuUitate Magi^e.

3. De Mirabili Potestate Artis et Naturee.

4. Medulla Alchymiee.

5. De Arte Chemise.

6fc Breviorium Alchymiee. 7k Documenta Alchymiee.

8. De Alchymistarum Artibus.

9. De Secretis.

10. De Rebus Metallicis.

11. De Sculpturis Lapidum.

12. De Philosophorum Lapide.

13. Opus Majus, or Alchymia Major.

14. Breviarium de Dono Dei.

15. Verbum abbreviatum de Leone Viridi.

16. Secretum Secretorum.

17. Tractatus Trium Verborum.

18. Speculum Secretorum.

\ number of these were collected together, and pub- ished at Frankfort in 1603, under the title of ** Rogeri Baconis Angli de Arte Chemiee Scripta," in a small luodecimo volume. The Opus Majus was published n London in 1733, by Dr. Jebb, in a folio volume.

* This tract and the next, which is of considerahle lengthy (rill be found inMaogetus's Bibliotheca ChemlcaCuriosa, i. 613.

d2

36 HISTORY. OF CHEMISTRY. 'i

Several of his tracts still continue in manuscript in. t)ie Harleian and Bodleian libraries at Oxford. He , considered the metals as compound of mercury and sulphur. Gmelin affirms that he was aware of the peculiar nature of manganese, and that he was ac- quainted with bismuth ; but after perusing the whole of the Speculum Alchymise, the third chapter of which he quotes as containing the facts on which he founds his opinion, I cannot find any certain allusion either to manganese or bismuth. The term magnesia indeed occurs, but nothing is said respecting its nature : and long after the time of Paracelsus, bismuth {bisematum). was considered as an impure kind of lead. That he was ajcquainted with the composition and properties of gunpowder admits of no doubt. In the sixth chapter of his epistle De Secretis Operibus Artis et Natures et de NuUitate Magise, the following passage occurs : .

'^ For sounds like thunder, and coruscations like lightning, may be made in the air, and they may be rendered even more horrible than those of nature her- self. A small quantity of matter, properly manufac- tured, not larger than the human thumb, may be made to produce a horrible noise and coruscation. And thii may be done many ways, by which a city or an anm may be destroyed, as was the case when Gideon an( his men broke their pitchers and exhibited their lamps fire issuing out of them with inestimable noise, dc stroyed an infinite number of the army of the Midiac ites." And in the eleventh chapter of the same epist' occurs the following passage : *' Mix together sal petre, luru vopo vir con utriet, and sulphur, and yc will make thunder and lightning, if you know t^ method of mixing them." Here all the ingredients gunpowder are mentioned except charcoal, which doubtless concealed under the barbarous terms Iv vopo vir con utriet.

But though Bacon was acquainted with gunpowd we have no evidence that he was the inventor. H

0¥ ALCHtMY. 3t

Far tlic celebrated Greek fire, concerning which so much has been written, was connected with gunpowder, tt is impossible to say ; but there is good evidence to prove that gunpowder was known and used in China before the commencement of the Christian era ; and Lord Bacon is of opinion that the thunder and light- ning and magic stated by the Macedonians to have been exhibited in Oxydrakes, when it was besieged by Alexander the Great, was nothing else than gun* powder. Now as there is pretty good evidence that the use of gunpowder had been introduced into Spain by the Moors, at least as early as the year 1343, and as Roger Bacon was acquainted with Arabic, it is by no means unlikely that he might have become ac- quainted with the mode of making the composition, and with its most remarkable properties, by perusing some Arabian writer, with whom we are at present unacquainted. Barbour, in his life of Bruce, informs us that guns were first employed by the English at the battle of Werewater, which was fought in 1327, about forty years after the death of Bacon.

Two novelties that day they saw,

That forouth in Scotland had been nene ;

Timbers for belmes was the ane

That they thought then of great beautie.

And also wonder for to see.

The other crakys were of war

That they before heard never air.

In another part of the same book we have the phrase gynnys for crakys, showing that the term crakys was used to denote a gun or musket of some form or other. It is curious that the English would seem to have been the first European nation that em- {^oyed gunpowder in war ; they used it in the battle of Crecy, fought in 1346, when it was unknown to the French, and it is supposed to have contributed m^^ terially to the hnUiant victory which was obtained.

38 HtSTOIiY eV CHEMISTRY.

4. Kaymond Lully is said to have becfb a scliolar and a fiiend of Roger Bacon. He was a most vo- luminous writer, and acquired as high a reputatioii as any of the alchymists. According to Mutius he was bom in Majorca in the year 1235. His father was seneschal to King James the First of Arragon, In his younger days he went into the army ; but afterwards held a situation in the court of his sove* reign. Devoting himself to science he soon acquired a competent knowledge of Latin and Arabic. After studying in Paris he got the degree of doctor conferred upon him. He entered into the order of Minorites, and induced King James to establish a cloister of thai order in Minorca. He afterwards travelled through Italy, Germany, England, Portugal, Cyprus, Armenia and Palestine. He is said by Mutius to have died in the year 1315, and to have been buried in Majorca, The following epitaph is given by Olaus Borrichius as engraven on his tomb :

Raymundus LuUi, cujus pla dogmata null! Sunt odiosa viro, jacet hie in marmore ipiro Hie M. et CC. Cum P. ccepit sine sensibus esse.

MC CC in these lines denote 1300, and P whicl is the 15th letter of the alphabet denotes 15, sotha if this epitaph be genuine it follows that his deati took place in the year 1315.

It seems scarcely necessary to notice the story thj Raymond Lully made a present to Edward, King of Enj land, of six millions of pieces of gold, to enable hirai 1 make war on the Saracens, which sum that monarch en ployed, contrary to the intentions of the donor, in h French wars. This story cannot apply to Edward III because in 1315, at the time of Raymond's death, th monarch was only three years of age. It can scaroc apply to Edward IL, who ascended the throtie 1 305 : but who had no opportunity of making m\ either on the Saracens or French, being totally aoe pied in oppoiing tha intrigaaa o^ b\a o^^ea and

0^ AtoaiTMir. 39

bellious subjects, to whom he ultimately fell ass^crifice. Edward the First made war both upon the Baracejos and the French, and lived during the time of Ray- mond : but his wars with the Saracens were finished before he ascended the throne, and during the whole of his reign he was too much occupied with his projected conquest of Scotland, to pay much serious attention to any French war whatever. The story, therefore, cannot apply to any of the three Edwards, and cannot be true. Raymond Lujly is said to have been stoned to death in Africa for preaching Christianity in the year 1315. Others will have it that he was alive in England in the year 1332, at which time his age would have been 97.

The following table esbihits a list of his numerous writings, most of which are to be found in the Theatrum Chemicum, the Artis Auriferee, or the Biblotheca Chemica.

1 . Praxis Universalis Magni Operis.

2. Clavicula.

3. Theoria et Practlca.

4. Compendium Animse Transmutationis Artis Me* tallorum.

5. Ultimum Testamentum. Of this work, which professes to give the whole doctrine of alchymy, there IS an English translation.

6. Elucidatio Testamenti.

7. Potestas Divitiorum cum Expositione Testa- menti Hermetis.

8. Compendium Artis Magicse, quoad Composi- tionem Lapidis.

9. De Lapide et Oleo Philosophorum.

10. Modus accipiendi Aurum Potabile.

11. Compendium Alchymies et Naturalis Phil«i» sophise.

12. Lapidarium.

13. Lux Mercuriorum.

14. 'ExperiBwata.

40 HISTORY OP CHEMISTRY.

15. Ars Compendiosa vel Vademecum.

16. De Accurtatione Lapidis. Several other tracts besides these are named b

Gmelin ; but I have never seen any of them. I havi attempted several times to read over the works Raymond Lully, particularly his Last Will and Tes- tament, which is considered the most important o€ them all. But they are all so obscure, and filled with such unintelligible jargon, that I have found it im- possible to understand them. In this respect they form a wonderful contrast with the works of Albertns Magnus and Roger Bacon, which are compcurativdy plain and intelligible. For an account, therefore, of the chemical substances with which he was ac^ quainted, I am obliged to depend on Gmelin ; though I put no great confidence in his accuracy. . like his predecessors, he was of opinion that all the metals are compounds of sulphur and mercury. But he seems first to have introduced those hiero- glyphical figures or symbols, which appear in such profusion in the English translation of his Last Will and Testament, and which he doubtless intended to illustrate his positions. Though what other purpose they could serve, than to induce the reader to conoder his statements as allegorical, it is not easy to conjec- ture. Perhaps they may have been designed to im- pose upon his contemporaries by an air of sometbinf very profound and inexplicable. For that he possessec a good deal of charlatanry is pretty evident, from thi slightest glance at his performances.

He was acquainted with cream of tartar, which h distilled : the residue he burnt, and observed that th alkali extracted deliquesced when exposed to the aii He was acquainted with nitric acid, which he ol tained by distilling a mixture of saltpetre and ^ee vitriol. He mentions its power of dissolving, q( merely mercury, but likewise other metals. He cou form aqua regia by adding ^ai axnmouiac or commc

OF AtCHTMY. 41

^Jt to nitric acid, and he was aware of the property ^liich it had of dissolving gold.

Spirit of wine was well known to him, and distin- %'liished by him by the names of aqua vitee ardens.and ^tgentum vivum yegetabile. He knew the method of tendering it stronger by an admixture of dry carbonate of potash, and of preparing vegetable tinctures by tneans of it. He mentions alum from Rocca, marcasite. White and red mercurial precipitate. He knew the volatile alkali and its coagulations by means of alco- hol. He was acquainted with cupeUated silver, and first obtained rosemary oil by distilling the plant with water. He employed a mixture of flour and white of egg spread upon a linen cloth to cement cracked glass vessels, and used other lutes for similar pur- poses.*

5. Amoldus de Villa Nova is said to have been bom at Villeneuve, a village of Provence, about the year 1240. Olaus Borrichius assures us, that in his time his posterity lived in the neighbourhood of Avig- non; that he was acquainted with them, and that they were by no means destitute of chemical know- ledge. He is said to have been educated at Barcelona, under John Casamila, a celebrated professor of medi- cine. This place he was obliged to leave, in consequence of foretelling the death of Peter of Arragon. He went to Paris, and likewise travelled through Italy. He afterwards taught publicly in the University of Mont- pelier. His reputation as a physician became so great, that his attendance was solicited in dangerous cases by several kings, and even by the pope himself. 'He was skilled in all the sciences of his time, and was besides a proficient in Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic. When at Pauris he studied astrology, and calculating the age of the world, he found that it was to termi- nate in the year 1335. The theologians of Paris ex*

'., • Gjiirf«i'5fitedilttiderCheime,i.74 **

4S HISTORY er cuEicistRr.

Glaimed against this and several other of his opimonSi and condemned our astrologer as a heretic. This obliged him to leave France ; but the pope protected him. He died in the year 1313, on his way to visit Pope Clement V. who lay sick at Avignon. The fol* lowing table exhibits a pretty full list of his works :

1. Antidotorium.

2. De Vinis.

3. De Aquis Laxativis.

4. Rosarius Philosophorum.

5. Lumen Novum.

6. De Sigillis.

7. Flos Florum.

8. Epistolee super Alchymia ad Regem Neapoli^ tanum.

9. Liber Perfectionis Magisterii.

10. Succosa Carmina.

11. Questiones de Arte Transmutationis Metal^ lorum.

12. Testamentum.

13. Lumen Luminum.

14. Practica.

It5. Speculum Alchymioe.

16. Carmen. c

17. Questiones ad Bonifacium. .(>

18. Semita Semitee. -.*

19. De Lapide Philosophorum. ;.

20. De Sanguine Humano. i

21. De Spiritu Vini, Vino Antimonii et Gemmorai| Viribus. i

Perhaps the most curious of all these works is dA JRosarium, which is intended as a complete eompen of all the alchymy of his time. The first part of i on the theory of the art is plain enough ; but the if cond part on the practice, which is subdivided ial thirty-two chapters, and which professes to teach di art of making the philosopher's stone^ is in man places quite unintelligible to me.

f»v AXicmrsfY* 4S

He eoBtldered, like bis predecesion, mercury as a constitaent of metals, and he professed a knowledge of the philosopher's stone, which he could increase at pleasure. Gold and gold-water was, in his opinion, t>ne of the most precious of medicines. He employed mercury in medicine. He seems to designate bismuth under the name marcasite. He was in the habit of preparing oil of turpentine, oil of rosemary, and spirit of rosemary, which afterwards became famous under the name of Hungary-water. These distillations were made in a glazed earthen vessel with a glass top and hehn.

His works were published at Venice in a single folio volume, in the year 1505. There were seven subsequent editions, the last of which appeared at Btrasburg in 1613.

6. John Isaac Hollandus and his countryman of the same name, were either two brothers or a fathier and son ; it is uncertain which. For very few circum- stances respecting these two laborious and meritorious men have been handed down to posterity. They were bom in the village of Stolk in Holland, it is supposed in the 13th century. Tliey certainly were after At* noldus de Villa Nova, because they refer to him in their writings. They wrote many treatises on che- mistry, remarkable, considering the time when they wrote, for clearness and precision, describing their pro* cesses with accuracy, and even giving figures of the instruments which they employed. This makes their books intelligible, and they deserve attention because they show that various processes, generally supposed of a more modem date were known to them. Their treatises are written partly in Latin and partly in Qer* man. The following list contains the names of most of them:

1. Opera Vegetabilia ad ejus alia Opera Intelli* genda Neceaaaria.

44 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY.

2. Opera Mineralia seu de Lapide Philosophico Libri duo.

3. Tractat vom stein der Weisen.

4. Fragmenta Qusedam Chemica.

5. De Triplice Ordine Elixiris et LapidisTlbeorea.

6. Tractatus de Salibus et Oleis Metallorum.

7. Fragmentum de Opere Philosophorum.

8. Rariores Chemise Operationes.

9. OpusSaturni.

10. De Spiritu Urinse.

1 1 . Hand der. Philosopher.

Olaus Borrichius complains that their opera mine" ralia abound with processes ; but that they are ambi- guous, and such that nothing certain can be deduced from them even after much labour.* Hence they draw on the unwary tyro from labour to labour. I am disposed myself to draw a different conclusion, from what I have read of that elaborate work. It is true that the processes which profess to make the philo- sopher's stone, are fallacious, and do not lead to the manufacture of gold, as the author intended, and ex<- pected: but it is a great deal when alchymistical processes are delivered in such intelligible languagis that you know the substances employed. This enables us easily to see the results in almost every case, ini to know the new compounds which were formed dunn|( a vain search for the philosopher's ^tone. Had tbB other alchymists written as plainly, the absurdity of their' researches would have been sooner discovered; and thus a useless or pernicious investigation wouUI have sooner terminated. "^

7. Basil Valentine is said to have been born abotil the year 1394, and is, perhaps, the most celebrated ol all the alchymists, if we except Paracelsus. He yr^$ a Benedictine monk, at Erford, in Saxony. If t*i believe Olaus Borrichius, his writings were enclosdl in the wall of a church at Erford, and were discoverai

0? A^CHYMY. 46.

long after his death, in consequence of the wall having been driven down by a thunderbolt. But this story is not well authenticated, and is utterly improbable.' Much of his time seems to have been taken up in the preparation of chemical medicines. It was he that first introduced antinjiony into medicine ; and it is said, though on no good authority, that he first tried the effects of antimonial medicines upon the monks of his convent, upon whom it acted with such violence that. he was induced to distinguish the mineral from which these medicines . had been extracted, by the name of antimoine (hostile to monks). What shows the improbability of this story is, that the works of Basil Valentine, and in particular his Currus trium- phalis Antimonii, were written in the German lan- guage. Now the German name for antimony is not antimoiney but speissglass. The Currus triumphalis Antimonii was translated into Latin by Kerkringius, who published it, with an excellent commentary, at Amsterdam, in 1671.

Basil Valentine writes with almost as much virulence against the physicians of his time, as Paracelsus him- self did afterwards. As no particulars of his life have been handed down to posterity, I shall satisfy myself with giving a catalogue of his writings, and then pointing out the most striking chemical substances with which he was acquainted.

The books which have appeared under the name of Basil Valentine, are very numerous ; but how many of them were really written by him, and how many are supposititious, is extremely doubtful. The follow- ing are the principal :

1 . Philosophia Occulta.

2. Tractat von naturlichen und ubernaturlichen Dingen ; auch von der ersten tinctur, Wurzel und Ceiste der Metallen.

13. Vpu dern grossen stein der Uhralten.

4$ HISTORY 69 CttEltlSTRT.

4. Vfertirattatlein vomftteindetr WeiiM. 5» KurzerftnliaRgundkla^ repetition od^Wiedur^ bolttiige Vom grosen stein der Uhralten.

6. De prima Materia Lapidis PhiloSophioi«

7. Aioitk Philesophotum seu Aurelild dtMlultlD Mi- Materia Lapidis Phiiosdphorunl^

8. Apocalypais Chemica. 9* Ciaves 13 Philosophise.

10> Practica.

11. Opus pfeeclarum ad utrumque, quod pro Tett4«^ . . mento dedit Filio suo adoptivo.

12. Lctztes Testament. . :i

13. De Microcosmo. \fi

14. Von der grosdn Heimlichkeit der Welt und ttMt..*} ArBney. ■ 1

15. Von der Wissenschaft der sieben Planeteii« ^/r

16. Offenbahrung der verborgenen Handgrifie. mj

17. Conclusiones or Schlussreden. -J

18. Dialogus Fratris Alberti cum Spiritu. lie

19. De Sulphure et fermento Philosophorum* tji

20. Haliographia. i*

21. Triumph wagen Antimottii. in

22. Einiger Weg zur Wahrheit. .^

23. Licht der Natur. *g The only one of these works that I have read witll^i

care, is KerkHngius*s translation and commentary dll»f the Currus triumphalis Antimonii. It is an excelleofci book, written with clearness and precision, and coof^, tains every thing respecting antimony that was knowihr before the commencement of the 19th century. Ham' much of this is owing to Kerkringius I cannot say, w6 I have never had an opportunity of seeing a copy dfi the original German work of Basil Valentine. /

Basil Valentine, like Isaac HoUandus, was of opi^. ilion that the metals are compounds of salt, sulphufl and mercury. The philosopher's stone was composes of the same ingredients. He affirmed^ that thete exiittf

a great similarity between the mode of putifjrin^ gold and curing the diseases df men, and that antimony answers best for both. He was acquainted with arsenic, knew, many of its properties, and mentions the red compound Which it forms with sulphur. Zinc seems to have been known to him, and he mentions bismuth, both under its own name, and under that of marcasite. He was aware that manganese was em- ployed to render glass colourless. He mentions nitrate of mercury, alludes to corrosive sublimate, and seems to have known the red oxide of mercury. It would be needless to specify the preparations of antimony with which he was acquainted ; scarcely one was unknown to him which, even at present, exists in the European Pharmacopoeias. Many of the preparations of lead were also familiar to him. He was aware that lead gives a sweet taste to vinegar. He knew sugar of lead, litharge, yellow oxide of lead, white carbonate of lead ; and mentions that this last preparation was often adulterated in his time. He knew the method of making green vitriol, and the double chloride of iron and ammonia. He was aware that iron could be precipitated from its solution by potash, and that iron has the property of throwing down copper. He was aware that tin sometimes contains iron, and ascribed the brittleness of Hungarian iron to copper. He knew that oxides of copper gave a green colour to glass ; that Hungarian silver contained gold; that gold is precipitated from aqua regia by mercury, in the state of an amalgam. He mentions fulminating gold. But the important facts contained in his works are so numerous, while we are so uncertain about the genu- ineness of the writings themselves, that it will scarcely be worth while to proceed further with the catalogue.

Thus I have brought the history of alchymy to the time of Paracelsus, when it was doomed to undergo a new and important change. U will be better, there-

48 HI8T01VY OF CHIPOSTBT.

fore, not to pursue the history of aldiymy further, hot to take up the history of true chemistry ; and in the first place to endeavour to determine what chemical facts were known to the Ancients, and how far the science had proceeded to develop itself before the time of Paracelsus.

'.■V

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eHEMtSTRY OF THE ANCIEITTS. 49

CHAPTER II.

. OF THE CHEMICAL KNOWLEDGE POSSESSED BY THX

ANCIENTS.

Notwithstanding the assertions of Olaus Borri- chius, and various other writers who followed him on the same side, nothing- is more certain than that the ancients have left no chemical writings behind them, and that no evidence whatever exists to prove that the science of chemistry was known to them. Scientific chemistry, on the contrary, took its origin from the col- lection and comparison of the chemical facts, made known by the practice and improvement of those branches of manufactures which can only be conducted by chemical processes. Thus the smelting of ores, and the reduction of the metals which they contain, is a chemical process ; because it requires, for its success, the separation of certain bodies which exist in the ore chemically combined with the metals ; and it cannot be done, except by the application or mixture of a new substance, having an affinity for these substances, and capable, in consequence, of separating them from the metal, and thus reducing the metal to a state of purity. The manufacture of glass, of soap, of leather, are all chemical, because they consist of processes, by means of which bodies, having an affinity for each other, are made to unite in chemical combination. Now I shall in this chapter point out the principal chemical manufactures XYiSLt were known to the ?LXiQ\eu\a,

vox. I, JB

50 KlStOAT OF CH£MI8TET.

that we may see how much they contributed towai laying the foundation of the science. The chief soun of our information on this subject are the writings the Greeks and Romans. Unfortunately the arts a manufactures stood in a very different degree of ef mation among the ancients from what they do amo the modems. Their artists and manufacturers wi chiefly slaves. The citizens of Greece and Rome c voted themselves to politics or war. Such of tlw as turned their attention to learning confined the selves to oratory j which was the most fashionft' and the most important study, or to history, or poet The only scientific pursuits which ever engaged d attention, were politics, ethics, and mathematics, r unless Archimedes is to be considered as an except! Scarcely any of the numerous branches of physics i mechanical philosophy, which constitute so gMd portion of modern science, even attracted the ait tion of the ancients.

In consequence of the contemptible light in all mechanical employments were viewed by th#i cients, we look in vain in ai^ of their writin accurate details respecting the processes which 1 followed. The only exception to this general n^ and contempt for all the arts and trades, is Plin; Elder, whose object, in his natural history. Collect into one focus, every thing that was knoti the period when he lived. His work displays gious reading, and a vast fund of erudition, him that we are chiefly indebted for the knowl the chemical arts which were practised by the an< But the low estimation in which these arts were" appears evident from the wonderful want of infi tion which Pliny so frequently displays, aild*' erroneous statements which he has recorded resp6^ these processes. Still a great deal may be drawiL'ft the information which has been collected and td| mined to us by this indefatigable natural histoikfjiji^

CHEMlStmr Of tttE AKCIElfTS. 51

1. — The ancients were acquainted with SEVsit METALS ; namely, gold, silver, mercury, copper, iron, tin, and lead. They knew and employed various pre- parations of zinc, and antimony, and arsenic ; though we have no evidence that these bodies were known to them in the metallic state.

1 . Gold is spoken of in the second chapter of Gene^ sis as existing and familiarly known before the flood.

" The name of the first is Pison ; that is it which encompasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good : there is bdellium and the onyx-stone." The Hebrew word for gold, ^"Tt {zeb) signifies to be clear, to shine ; alluding, doubtless, to the brilliancy of that metal. The term ffold occurs frequently in the writings of Moses, and the metal must have oeen in common use among the Egyptians, when that legislator led the children of Israel out of Egypt.* Gold is found in the earth almost always in a native state. There can be no doubt that it was much more abundant on the surface of the earth, and in the beds of rivers in the early periods of so- ciety, than it is at present: indeed this is obvious, from the account which Pliny gives of the numerous places in Asia and Greece, and other European coun- tries, where gold was found in his time.

Gold, therefore, could hardly fail to attract the at- tention of the very first inhabitants of the globe ; its beauty, its malleability, its indestructibility, would give it value : accident would soon discover the pos- sibility of melting it by heat, and thus of reducing tha grains or small pieces of it found on the surface of the earth into one large mass. It would be speedily made into ornaments and utensils of various kinds, and thus gradually would come into common use. This we find to have occurred in America, when it was dis-

• Exodus xi. 2--xiv.n, 12, 13, 17, 18, 24, 25, 26— ra¥&^

E 2

52 HISTORY OF CHEMISTKT«

covered by Columbus. The inhabitants of the tropical parts of that vast continent were familiarly acquainted vith gold ; and in Mexico and Peru it existed in great abundance; indeed the natives of these countries seem to have been acquainted with no other metal, or at least no other metal was brought into such general use, except silver, which in Peru was, it is true, still more common than gold.

Gold, then, was probably the first metal with which man became acquainted ; and that knowledge mus^ have preceded the commencement of history, since it is mentioned as a common and familiar substance in the Book of Genesis, the oldest book in existence, of the authenticity of which we possess sufficient evidence, The period of leading the children of Israel out of \ Egypt by Moses, is generally fixed to have been one '^ thousand six hundred and forty-eight years before the commencement of the Christian era. So early, then, we are certain, that not only gold, but the other six malleable metals known to the ancients, wer^ familiar to the inhabitants of Egypt. The Greeks ascribe the discovery of gold to the earliest of theii: heroes. According to Pliny, it was discovered on Mount Pangseus by Cadmus, the Phoenician: but Cadmus's voyage into Greece was nearly coeval with the exit of the Israelites out of Egypt, at which time we learn from Moses that gold was in common uae in Egypt. All that can be meant, then, is, that CdL^ ' mus first discovered gold in Greece ; not that he mad^ mankind first acquainted with it. Others say thai Thoas and Eaclis, or Sol, the son of Oceanus, first found gold in Panchaia. Thoas was a contemporary of the heroes of the Trojan war, or at least was posterior to the Argonautic expedition, and consequently loxjj posterior to Moses and the departure of the childrea of Israel from Egypt.

2. Silver also was not only familiarly known to th^ Egyptians in the time of Moses, but, as ve learn fr<U9*

CHEMISTRY OF tHE ANCIEtTTS. 53

Genesis, was coined into money before Joseph was set over the land of I^ypt by Pharaoh, which happened one thousand eight hundred and seventy-two years before the commencement of the Christian era, and conse-*

Suently two hundred and twenty-four years before the eparture of the children of Israel out of Egypt.

** And Joseph gathered up all the money that was found in the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, for the com which they bought ; and Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh's house.* The Hebrew word 5)D3 (kemep), translated money, signifies silver, and was so called from its pale colour. Silver occurs in many other passages of the writings of Moses. f The Greeks inform us, that Erichthonius the Athenian, or Ceacus, were the discoverers of silver ; but both of these individuals were long posterior to the time of Joseph.

Silver, like gold, occurs very frequently in the metallic state. This, no doubt, was a still more frequent occurrence in the early ages of the world ; it would therefore attract the attention of mankind as early as gold, and for the same reason. It is very ductile, very beautiful, and much more easily fused than gold : it would be therefore more easily reduced into masses, and formed into different utensils and orna- ments than even gold itself. The ores of it which occur in the earth are heavy, and would therefore draw the attention of even rude men to them : they have, most of them at least, the appearance of being metallic, and the most common of them may be reduced to the state of metallic silver, simply by keeping them a sufficient time in fusion. Accordingly we find that the Peru- vians, before they were overrun by the Spaniards, had made themselves acquainted with the mode of digging out and smelting the ores of silver which occur in

* Genesis xlvii. 14.

t For example. Exodus xi. 2— xxvi. 19, 21— xxvii. 10,11, 17, &c.

54 HISTORY OF CHSMISTKT*

their country, and that many of their most common utensils were made of that metal.

Silver and ^old approached each other nearer in value among the ancients than at present : an ouncci of fine gold was worth from ten to twelve ounces of fine silver y the variation depending upon the accidental relation of the supply of both metals. But after the discovery of America, the quantity of silver found in that continent, especially in Mexico, was so gpreat, compared with that of the gold found, that silver became considerably cheaper; so that an ounce of fine gold came to be equivalent to about fourteen ounces and a half of fine silver. Of course these relative values have fluctuated a little according to the abundance of the supply of silver. Though the revolution in the Spanish American colonies has con 1 siderably diminished the supply of silver from th^ mines, that deficiency seems to have been supplied by other ways, and thus the relative proportion betweea the value of gold and silver has continued nearly un- altered.

3. That copper must have been known in the earliest ages of society, is sufficiently evident. It occurs fre-t quently native, and could not fail to attract the atten«> tion of mankind, from its colour, weight, and mall^-, bility. It would not be difficult to fuse it even in tfaiift rudest ages : and when melted into masses, as it ii malleable and ductile, it would not require much skil{. to convert it into useful and ornamental utensils. J^ Hebrew word JWHi (necheshet) translated brass^ olh. viously means copper. We have the authority of tfa^. Book of Genesis to satisfy us that copper was Iqiow^. before the flood, and probably as early as either silvQC. or gold.

** And Zillah, she also bore Tubal-cain, an instruo* .'. tor of every artificer in brass (copper) and iron."*

♦ Genesis iV. 22.

CHEHISTI^T Of THE AVCIB|rrS. 9$

The word copper occurs in many other psuMUtged of the writings of Moses.* That the Hebrew word tram* lated brass must have meant copper is obvious, fVom the following passage : '^ Out of whose hills tho!l mayest dig brass/'f Brass does not exist in the eartht nor any ore of it, it is always made artificially ; it must therefore have been copper, or an ore of copper, that was alluded to by Moses.

Copper must have been discovered and brought into common use long before iron or steel ; for Homer re- presents his heroes of the Trojan war as armed with swords, &c. of copper. Copper itself is too soft to be made into cutting instruments ; but the addition of a little tin gives it the requisite hardness. Now we learn from the analyses of Klaproth, that the copper swords of the ancients were actually hardened by the addition of tin.t

Copper was the metal in common use in the early part of the Roman commonwealth. Romulus coined copper money alone. Numa established a college of workers in copper (arariorumfabrum),^

The Latin word <bs sometimes signifies copper, and sometimes brass. It is plain from what Pliny says on the subject, that he did not know the difference between copper and brass ; he says, that an ore of as occurs in Cyprus, called chaldtisy where cea was first discor vered. Here (bs obviously means copper. In another place he says, that cbs is obtained from a mineral called cadmia. Now from the account of cadmia by Pliny and Dioscorides, there cannot be a doubt that it is th« ore to which the modems have given the name of calamine, by means of which brass is made. It is sometimes a silicate and sometimes a carbonate of of zinc ; for both of these ores are confounded together

» For example, Exodug xxvii, 2, 3, 4, 6, 10, 11, 17, 18, 19— XXX. 18, &c. Numbers xxi. 9. tDeut.viU.9. J Beitrage, vi. 81. 5 Pl«ui Hist. NaX, xxw.V

56 HISTORY OF CHEMISTST.

under the name of cadmia, and both are employed in the manufacture of brass.

Solinus says, that cea was first made at Chalcis, a town in Eubcea. Hence the Greek name, "xblKko^ (chalkos)y by which copper was distinguished.

The proper name for brass, by which is meant an alloy of copper and zinc, was aurichalcuniy or golden, or yellow copper. Pliny says, that long before hi« time, the ore of aurichalcum was exhausted, so that no more of that beautiful alloy was made. Are we to conclude from this, that there once existed an ore con- sisting of calamine and ore of copper, mixed or united together ? After the exhaustion of the auri- chalcum mine, the salustianum became the most fa- * mous ; but it soon gave place to the livianuniy a cop- per-mine in (raul, named after Livia, the wife of Augustus. Both these mines were exhausted in the time of Pliny. The ess marianum^ or copper of Cor- dova, was the most celebrated in his time. This last 4Bs,he says, absorbs most cadmia, and acquires the greatest resemblance to aurichalcum. We see from this, that in Pliny's time brass was made artificially, and by a process similar to that still followed by the moderns.

The most celebrated alloy of copper among the ancients, was the as corinthium, or Corinthian cop* per, formed accidentally, as Pliny informs us, during* . the burning of Corinth by Mummius in the year 608^ after the building of Rome, or one hundred and forty- five years before the commencement of the Christian era. There were four kinds of it, of wliich Pliny givei . the following description ; not, however, very intellig^ ble : ' .'.

1. White. It resembled silver much in its lustre|t^' and contained an excess of that metal. . '

2. Red. In this kind there is an excess of gold^ [^

3. In the third kind, gold, silver, and copper 90 mixed in equal proportions.

CHEMISTRT OF THE AVCIEKT8. 5t

4. The fourth kmd is called kepatizon^ from its having a liver colour. It is this colour which gives it its Talue.*

Copper was put by the ancients to almost all the uses to which it is put by the modems. One of the great sources of consumption was bronze statues, which were first introduced into Rome after the con- quest of Asia Minor. Before that time, the statues of the Romans were made of wood or stoneware. Pliny gives various formulas for making bronze for statues. Of these it may be worth while to put down the most material.

1 . To new copper add a third part of old copper. To every hundred pounds of this mixture, twelve pounds ^d a half of tinf are added, and the whole melted together.

2. Another kind of bronze for statues was formed, by melting together

lOOlbs. copper, lOlbs. lead, 51bs. tin.

3. Their copper-pots for boiling consisted of lOOlbs. of copper, melted with three or four pounds of tin.

The four celebrated statues of horses which, during the reign of Theodosius II. were transported from Ohio to Constantinople; and, when Constantinople was taken and plundered by the Crusaders and Vene- tians in 1204, were sent by 'Martin Zeno and set up by the doge, Peter Ziani, in the portal of St. Mark ; were in 1798, transported by the French to Paris ; and finally, after the overthrow of Buonaparte, and the restoration of the Bourbons in 1815, returned to

• Plinii Hist. Nat. xxxiv. 2.

t Pliny's phrase is plumbum argentorium. But that the ad- dition was tin, and consequently that plumbum argentorium meant tin, we have the evidence of Klaproth, who analyzed sereral of these bronze statues, and found them composed of copper, lead, and tin, .

SS mSTOBT CfW C9UCIfntT«

Venice and placed upon their ancient pedestals. The metal of wnich these hones had been made was exa« mined by Klaproth, and found by him composed of

Copper, 993

Tin, 7

1000* Klaproth also analyzed an ancient bronze statue in one of the German cabinets, and found it composed of •

Copper, 916 Tin, 75

Lead, 9

lOOOt Several other old brass and bronze pieces of metal, very ancient, but found in Germany, were also ana- lyzed by Klaproth. The result of lus analyses was at follows :

The metal of which the altar of Kjrodo was made consisted of

Copper, 69 Zinc, 18 Lead, 13 ^

loot^ r

The emperor's chair, which had in the eleventh cen*/ tury been transported from Harzburg ttf Goslar, wh^^ : it still remains, was found to be composed of \ "'

Copper, 92-5 'L'

Tin, 5 r

Les^d, 2'5

100§ 'J

Another piece of metal, which enclosed the high altaf{

in a church in Germany, was composed of ,^

♦ Beitrage, vi. 89. "^ *«

t Beitrage, vi. 118. The statue ia que^tioa was known by tilf name of ** Tbe Statue of FUstriclui,'* at Soudenbauaen. ; / Ibid., p. 127. § Ibid., p. 132.

CHEMI3T|tY Of T«£ 4KCIWT8. S9

Copper, 75 Tin, 12'5

Lead, 12'o

100*

These analyses, though none of them corresponds exactly with the proportions given by Pliny, confirms sufficiently his general statement, that the bronze of the ancients employed for statues was copper, alloyed with lead and tin.

Some of the bronze statues cast by the ancients were of enormous dimensions, and show decisively the great progress which had been inade by them in the art of working and casting metals. The addition of the lead and tin would not only add greatly to the hardness of the alloy, but would at the same time render it more easily fusible. The bronze statue of Apollo, placed in the capitol at the time of Pliny, was forty-five feet high, and cost 500 talents, equivalent to about £50,000 of our money. It was brought from ApoUonia, in Pontus, by Lucullus. The famous statue of the sun at Rhodes was the work of Chares, a disciple of Ly- sippus ; it was ninety feet high, was twelve years in mailing, and cost 300 talents (about £30,000). It was made out of the engines of war left by Demetrius when he raised the siege of Rhodes. After standing fifty-six years, it was overthrown by an earthquake^ It lay on the ground 900 years, and was sold by Mauvia, king of the Saracens, to a merchant, who loaded 900 camels with the fragments of it.

Copper was introduced into medicine at rather an early period of society, and various medicinal pre- parations of it are described by Dioscorides and Pliny. It remains for us to notice the most remarkable of these. Pliny mentions an institution, to which ha gives the name of Seplasia ; the object of which was,

* Ibid., p, 134.

60 HISTORY OP CHEICISTKY.

to prepare medicines for the use of medical men. ] seems, therefore, to have been similar to our apothi cai'ies* shops of the present day. Pliny reprobates th conduct of the persons who had the charge of thea Seplasise in his time. They were in the habit of adul terating medicines to such a degree, that nothing goo or genuine could be procured from them.*

Both the oxides of copper were known to the an cients, though they were not very accurately distin guished from each other : they were known by ij^ names Jlos (eris and scoria cpris, or squama mffjf^ They were obtained by heating bars of copper red-faf and letting them cool, exposed to the air. What j||) off during the cooling was iXxeflos, what was driff off by blows of a hammer was the squama or scfk^ eeris. It is obvious, that all these substances nearly of the same nature, and that they wei6i reality mixtures of the black and red oxides of copji

Stomoma seems also to have been an oxide of cm per, which was gradually formed upon the surfaca^ the metal, when it was kept in a state of fusion, ^jg

These oxides of copper were used as external. bI plications in cases of polypi of the nose, diseascJM the anus, ear, mouth, &c., seemingly as escharotM

JErugo, verdigris, was a subacetate of copj"" doubtless often mixed with subacetate of zinc, as^ only copper but brass also was used for preparii The mode of preparing this substance was simil the process still followed. Whether verdigris j employed ^ a paint by the ancients does not ap] for Pliny takes no notice of any such use of it. Chalcantum, called also atramentum su\ was probably a mixture of sulphate of coppei sulphate of iron. Pliny's account of the mode of curing it is too imperfect to enable us to iotm. ideas concerning it ; but it was crystallized on i

* PUnii Hist Nat. zxiiv. 11. : ^

CHEltlSTRY OF THE ANCIEVTS. 61

which were extended for the purpose in the solution : its colour was blue, and it was transparent like glassi This description might apply to sulpnate of copper ; but as the substance was used for blackening leathn*, and on that account was called atramentum sutoritanf it is obvious that it must have contained also sulphate of iron,

^jaleitULWQB the name for an ore of copper. The account given of it by Pliny agrees best with cppper pyrites, which is now known to be a sulphur salt ^ composed of one atom of sulphide of copper (the acid) united to one atom of sulphide of iron (the base). Pliny informs us, that it is a mixture of cop^ per^ misy, and sory : its colour is that of honey. By age, he says, it changes into sory. I think it most probable that native sory, of which Pliny speaks, was sulphuret of copper, and artificial sory sulphate of copper. The native sory is said to constitute black veins in chalcitis. Pliny's description of misy (/itav) best agrees with copper pyrites. Dioscorides describes it as hard, as having the colour of gold, and as shin- ing like a star.* All this agrees pretty well with cop- per pyrites.

Scoleca (so called because it assumed the shape of a worm) was formed by triturating alumen, carbonate of soda, and white vinegar, till the matter became green. It was probably a mixture of sulphate of soda, acetate of soda, acetate of alumina, and acetate of copper, probably with more or less oxide of copper, <fec., de- pending upon the proportions of the respective con- stituents employed.

Such 'are the preparations of copper, employed by the ancients. They were only used as external applica- tions, partly as escharotics, and partly to induce ulcers to put on a healthy appearance. It does not appear that copper was ever used by the ancients as an internal remedy.

^*Lib,Y. c. 117.

64 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY^

Egyptians, iron must have been in common use hx Egypt : for he mentions furnaces for working iron ;* ores from which it was extracted ;t and tells us that swords t, knives, II axes, § and tools for cutting stoneSylF were then made of that metal. Now iron in its pure metallic state is too soft to be applied to these uses t it is obvious, therefore, that in Moses's time, not only iron but steel also must have been in common use in Egypt. From this we see how much further advanced the Egyptians were than the Greeks in the knowledge of the manufacture of this most important metal : for during the Trojan war, which was several centuries after the time of Moses, Homer represents his heroes as armed with swords of copper, hardened by tin, and as never using any weapons of iron what- ever. Nay, in such estimation was it held, that Achilles, when he celebrated games in honour of Pa-* trocles, proposes a ball of iron as one of his most va» luable prizes.**

«

" Tlien hurl'd the hero, thundering on the ground, A mass of iron (an enormous round), "Whose weight and size the circling Greeks admire, Rude from the furnace and hut shaped hy fire. This mighty quoit JEtion wont to rear, And from his whirling arm dismiss'd in air ; The giant hy Achilles slain, he stow'd Among his spoils this memorable load. For this he bids those nervous artists vie That teach the disk to sound along the sky. Let him whose might can hurl this bowl, arise ; Who farthest hurls it, takes it as his prize : If he be one enrich'd with large domain • Of downs for flocks and arable for grain. Small stock of iron needs that man provide, .' : His hinds and swains whole years shall be supplied From hence : nor ask the neighbouring city's aid For ploughshares, wheels, and all the rural trade.*'

* Deut. iv. 20. f Deut. viii. 9. X Numbers xxxr. 16, )) Levit. i. 17. § Deut. xviii. 5. f Deut.xxyii. 5. ^i' mad, Jib. xxiii. 1. 826,

cnEmsTitY OP THE AKaEOTs. 6s

Tlie mass of iron was large enough to supply a shepherd or a ploughman with iron for five years. This circumstance is a sufficient proof of the high esti- mation in which iron was held during the time of Homer. Were a modem poet to represent his hero as holding out a large lump of iron as a prize, and were he to represent this prize as eagerly contended for by kings and princes, it would appear to us per- fectly ridiculous.

Hesiod informs us, that the knowledge of iron was brought over from Phrygia to Greece by the Dactyli, who settled in Crete during the reign of Minos I., about 1431 years before the commencement of the Christian era, and consequently about sixty years before the departure of the children of Israel from Egypt: and it does not appear, that in Homer's time, which was about five hundred years later, the art of smelting iron had been so much improved, as to enable men to apply it to the common purposes of life, as had long before been done by the Egyptians. The general opinion of the ancients was, that the me- thod of smelting iron ore had been brought to perfec- tion by the Chalybes, a small nation situated near the Black Sea,* and that the name chalybs, occasionally used for steel, was derived from that people.

Pliny informs us, that the ores of iron are scattered very profusely almost every where : that they exist in Elba; that there was a mountain in Cantabria com- posed entirely of iron ore; and that the earth in Cap- padocia, when watered from a certain river, is coiivert- ed into iron.f He gives no account of the mode of smelting iron ores ; nor does he appear to have been acquainted with the processes ; for he says that iron is reduced from its ore precisely in the same way as copper is. Now we know, that the processes for

smelting copper and iron are quite different, and

♦ Xenophon's Anabasw, r. 5. f Plinji Hist, "Nat, XttVr, \\, vox, /• F

66 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY*

founded upon different principles. He s^ys^ that in his time many different kinds of iron existed, and they were stricturce^ in Latin a stringenda acie, ■ That steel was well known and in common use when Pliny wrote is obvious from many considerations ; but he seems to have had no notion of what constituted the difference between iron and steel, or of the me- thod employed to convert iron into steel. In his opi- nion it depended upon the nature of the water, and consisted in heating iron red-hot, and plunging it, while in that state, into certain waters. The waters at Bilbilis and Turiasso, in Spain, and at Comum, in Italy, possessed this extraordinary virtue. The best steel in Pliny's time came from China ; the next best, in point of quality, was manufactured in Parthia.

It would appear, that at Noricum steel was manu-' factured "directly from the ore of iron. This process was perfecly practicable, and it is said still to be prac* tised in certain cases.

The ancients were acquainted with the method of rendering iron, or rather steel, magnetic ; as appears from a passage in the fourteenth chapter of the thirty* fourth book of Pliny. Magnetic iron was distinguished by the name of ferrura vivum.

When iron is dabbed over with alumen and vinegar it becomes like copper, according to Pliny. Gerussa; gypsum, and liquid pitch, keep it from rusting. Pliny was of opinion that a method of preventing iron from rusting had been once known, but had been lost be* fore his time. The iron chains of an old bridge over the Euphrates had not rusted in Pliny's time ; but a few new links, which had been added to supply the place of some that had decayed, were become rusty.

It would appear from Pliny, that the ancients made

use of something very like tractors ; for he says that

pain in the side is relieved by holding near it the

point oi a dagger that has wounded a man. Watei

CHEMISTRY Of THE AKCIlffTS. '67

in whicli red-hot iron had been plunged was i^ecom- inended as a cure for the dysentery ; and the actual cautery with red-hot iron, Pliny informs us, prevents hydrophobia, when a person has been bitten by a mad dog.

: Rust of iron and scales of iron were used by the ancients as astringent medicines. >^. Tin, also, must have been in common use in the -^ime of Moses ; for it is mentioned without any ob- servation as one of the common metals.* And from the way in which it is spoken of by Isaiah and Eze- kiel, it is obvious that it was considered as of far in- ferior value to silver and gold. Now tin, though the ores of it where it does occur are usually abundant, is rather a scarce metal : that is to say, there are but few spots on the face of the earth where it is known to exist. Cornwall, Spain, in the mountains of Gal- licia, and the mountains which separate Saxony and Bohemia, are the only countries in Europe where tin ^ occurs abundantly. The last of these localities has not been known for five centuries. It was from Spain and from Britain that the ancients were supplied with tin ; for no mines of tin exist, or have ever been known to exist, in Africa or Asia, except in the East Indies. The Phoenicians were the first nation which caried on a great trade by sea. There is evidence that at a very early period they traded with Spain and with Britain, and that from these countries they drew their supplies of tin. It was doubtless the Phoe- nicians that supplied the Egyptians with this metal. They had imbibed strongly a spirit of monopoly ; and to secure the whole trade of tin they carefully con- cealed the source from which they drew that metal. Hence, doubtless, the reason why the Grecian geogra- ^ phers, who derived their information from the Phoe- / nicians, represented the Insulse Cassiterides, or tin

• f^nmhers xxxi, 22* ' Jf2

68 mSTO&T OF CHEMIST&T.

islands, as a set of islands lying off the north coast of Spain. We know that in fact the Scilly islands, in these early ages, yielded tin, though doubtless the great supply was drawn from the neighbouring pro- vince of Cornwall. It was probably from these islands ^hat the Greek name for tin was derived (icacrffircpoc). Even Pliny informs us, that in his time tin was ob^ tained from the Cassiterides, and from Lusitaoia and Gallicia. It occurs, he says, in grains in alluvial soil, from which it is obtained by washing. It is in black grains, the metallic nature of which is only re- cognisable by the great weight. This is a pretty ac* curate description of stream tin, which we know for- merly constituted the only ore of that metal wrought in Cornwall. He says that the ore occurs also along with grains of gold ; that it is separated from the soU by washing along with the grains of gold, and after- wards smelted separately.

Pliny gives no particulars about the mode of re- ducing the ore of tin to the metallic state ; nor is it a( all likely that he was acquainted with the process.

The Latin term for tin was plumbum album. StanA num is also used by Pliny; but it is impossible to understand the account which he gives of it. There is, he says, an ore consisting of lead, united to silver. Wh^n this ore is smelted, the first metal that flowt out is st annum. What flows next is silver. What remains in the furnace is galena. This being smelted^ yields lead. :i

Were we to admit the existence of an ore composed of lead and silver, it is obvious that no such product! could be obtained by simply smelting it. i

Cassiteros, or tin, is mentioned by Homer; and^" from the way in which the metal is said by him t»' have been used, it is obvious that in his time it bom ft much higher price, and, consequently, was more valued than at present. In his description of the breastplate of Agamemnon^ he says that it contained ten bands

CHBMISTRT OF THE AVCIEVTS, ^

of steel, twelve of gold, and twenty of tin (ca^inpoio).* And in the twenty-third book of the Iliad (line 561), Achilles describes a copper breastplate surrounded with shining tin (^tivov Kcuratrepoio). Pliny informs us, that in his time tin was adulterated by adding to it about one-third of white copper. A pound of tin, when Pliny lived, cost ten denarii. Now, if we reckon a denarius at 7^d,, with Dr. Arbuthnot, this would make a Roman pound of tin to cost 6s» 5^d» But, as the Roman pound was only equal to three-fourths of our avoirdupois pound, it is plain that in the time of Pliny an avoirdupois pound of tin was worth 85. 7j|€f., which is almost seven times the price of tin in the present day.

Tin, in the time of Pliny, was used for covering the inside of copper vessels, as it is at this day. And, no doubt, the process still followed is of the same nature as the process used by the ancients for tinning copper. Pliny remarks, with surprise, that copper thus tinned does not increase in weight. Now Bayen ascertained that a copper pan, nine inches in diameter, and three inches three lines in depth, when tinned, only ac- quired an additional weight of twenty-one grains. These measures and weights are French. When we convert them into English, we have a copper pan 9*59 inches in diameter, and 3*46 inches deep, which, when tinned, increased in weight 17 '23 troy grains. Now the surface of the copper pan, thus tinned, was 176*468 square inches. Hence it follows, that a square inch of copper, when tinned, increases in weight only 0*097 grains. This increase is so small, that we may excuse Pliny, who probably had never seen the increase of weight determined, except by means of a rude Roman statera, for concluding that there was no increase of weight whatever.

Tin was employed by the ancients for mirrors : but

. • nUd xL ^5.

72 HISTORY OF CHEMIST&T.

Argentarium is an alloy of equal parts of lead and tin. Tertiarium, of two parts lead and one part tin. It was used as a solder.

Some preparations of lead were used by the ancients in medicine, as we know from the description of them given us by Dioscorides and Pliny. These preparations consisted chiefly of protoxide of lead and lead reduced to powder, and partially oxidized by triturating it with water in a mortar. They were applied to ulcers, jand employed externally as astringents.

Molybdena was also employed in medicine. Pliny says It was the same as galena. From his descnption - ^ it is obvious that it was litharge ; for it was in scales, ^ and was more valued the nearer its colour approached x to that of gold. It was employed, as it still is, for j making plasters. Pliny gives us the process for ■;^ making the plaster employed by the Roman surgeons.. It was made by heating together

3 lbs. molybdena or litharge,

1 lb. wax, J

3 heminse, or 1 J pint, of olive oil. - ,*

This process is very nearly the same as the one at pre- .^

sent followed by apothecaries for making adhesive >

plaster. I

Psimmythium, or cerussa, was the same as our white .jl lead. It was made by exposing lead in sheets to ih^^t fumes of vinegar. It would seem probable from Pliny'sr^ account, though it is confused and inaccurate, thatfij the ancients were in the habit of dissolving cerussa ineJl vinegar, and thus making an impure acetate of lead, js

Cerussa was used in medicine. It constituted also ^ a common white paint. At one time, Pliny says, ittjf was found native ; but in his time all that was usedub was prepared artificially. v

Cerussa usta seems to have been nearly the same as m,fy our red lead. It was formed accidentally from cerussi^ ^ during the burning of the Pyrseus. The colour was purple. It was imitated at Rome by burning silig

..■jM

CHBMT8TBY (» THB AWCIBSTS, 73

', which was probably a variety of some of our ochres.

8. Besides the metals above enumerated, the an- cients were also acquainted with quicksilver. Nothing is known about the first discovery of this metal ; though it obviously precedes the commencement of history. I am not aware that the term occurs in the writings of Mosea, We have therefore no evidence that it was known to the Egyptians at that early period ; nor do 1 find any allusion to it in the works of Herodotus. But this is not surprising, as that author confines him- self chiefly to subjects connected with history, Dios- eorides and Pliny both mention it as common in their ' time. Dioscorides gives a method of obtaining it by sublimation from cinnabar, It is remarkable, because I it constitutes the first example of a process which ulti- I mately led to distillation."

Cinnabar is also described *by Theophrastus. The

I term mtntum was applied to it also, till in consequence of the adulteration of cinnabar with red lead, the term minium came at last to be restricted to that pre- I paration of lead. Theophrastus describes an artificial I cinnabar, which came from the country above Ephesus. It was a shining red-coloured sand, which was col-

Ilected and reduced to a fine powder by pounding it in Vessels of stone. We do not know what it was. The native cinnabar was found in Spain, and was used chieily as a paint. Dioscorides employs mimam as

Ilhe name for what we at present call cinnabar, or bisul- phuret of mercury. His cinnabar was a red paint from Africa, produced in such small quantity that [ paiotei's could scarcely procure enough of it to answer

their purposes. I Mercury is described by Pliny as existing native in the mines of Spain, and Dioscorides gives the process for extracting it from cinnabar. It was employed in

*. Ditwcorjdeiij iib. r.,c. 110.

74' HISTOEY or CHEMISTRY.

gilding precisely as it is by the moderns. Pliny was aware of its great specific gravity, and of the readiness with which it dissolves gold. The amalgam was squeezed through leather, which separated most of the quicksilver. When the solid amalgam remaining was heated, the mercury was driven off and pure gold remained.

It is obvious from what Dioscorides says, that the properties of mercury were very imperfectly known to him. He says that it may be kept in vessels of glass, or of lead, or of tin, or of silver.* Now it is well known that it dissolves lead, tin, and silver with so much rapidity, that vessels of these metals, were mep» cury put into them, would be speedily destroyed* Pliny's account of quicksilver is rather obscure. It seems doubtful whether he was aware that native or* gentum vivum and the hydrargyrum extracted from cinnabar were the same.

Cinnabar was occasionally used as an eii^temal medicine ; but Pliny disapproves of it, assuring hif readers that quicksilver and all its preparations are virulent poisons. No other mercurial preparationi except cinnabar and the amalgam of mercury seeni to have been known to the ancients. f

9. The ancients were unacquednted with the metal to which we at present give the name of antimaw^i but several of the ores of that metal, and of the pvm ducts of these ores were not altogether unknown^ them. From the account of stimmi and stibium, 1^ Dioscorides]; and Pliny,§ there can be little doubt that these names were applied to the mineral now callMl sulphuret of antimony or crude antimony. It is fooad most commonly, Pliny says, among the ores of 8ilv|r»

* Lib. V. c. 110.

t The ancients were in the habit of extracting: mercury fiopil cinnabar, by a kind of imperfect distillation. The native ms^ cury they called argentumvivumy that from cinnabar hydrUt^ gyms. See Plinii Hist. Nat. zxxiii. 8.

^ Lib, v. c. 99. $ Lib. xzxiii. c. 6.

CHEMISTBT OF THE AKCIEKTS. 75

and consists of two kinds, the male and the female ; the latter of which is most valued.

Hiis pigment was known at a very early period, and employed by the Asiatic ladies in painting their eyelashes, or rather the insides of their eyelashes, black. Thus it is said of Jezebel, that when Jehu came to Jezreel she painted her face. The original is, she put her eyes in sulphuret of antimony * A similar expression occurs in Ezekiel, " For whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes" — ^literally, put thy eyes in sulphuret of antimony, f ^This custom of painting the eyes black with antimony was trans* ferred from Asia to Greece, and while the Moors oc- cupied Spain it was employed by the Spanish ladies also. It is curious that the term alcoholy at present confined to spirit of vnne, was originally applied to the powder of sulphuret of antimony. J The ancients were in the habit of roasting sulphuret of antimony, and thus converting it into an impure oxide. This preparation was also called stimmi and stibium. It was employed in medicine as an external application, and was conceived to act chiefly as an astringent; Dios- corides describes the method of preparing it. We see, from Pliny's account of stibium, that he did not distinguish between sulphuret of antimony and oxide of antimony. §

9. Some of the compounds of arsenic were also known to the ancients ; though they were neither ac- quainted with this substance in the metallic state, nor with its oxide ; the poisonous nature of which is so violent that had it been known to them it could not have been omitted by Dioscorides and Pliny«

* 12 Kings ix. 30.

f Chap. 23. V. 40, the Vulgate has it forijSt^o) tovq 6^9aX/«ovC ffov,

X Hartmanni Praxis Chemiatrica, p. 598 § PlinU Hist. Nat.xxxiii. 6.

76 HISTORY or CHEMISTRY,

The word trav^apaxn (sandarache) occurs in Aristotle^ and the tenn <ipp€vtxov (arrenichon) in Theophrastus.* Dioscorides uses likewise the same name with Aristotle. It was applied to a scarlet-coloured mineral, which oc- curs native, and is now known by the name of realgar. It is a compound of arsenic and sulphur. It was em* ployed in medicine both externally and internally, and is recommended by Dioscorides, as an excellent re- medy for an inveterate cough.

Auripigmentum and arsenicum were names given to the native yellow sulphuret of arsenic. It was used in the same way, and considered by Dioscorides and Pliny as of the same nature with realgar. But there is no reason for supposing that the ancients were ac- quainted with the compositions of either of these bodies ; far less that they had any suspicion of the existence of the metal to which we at present give the * name of arsenic.

Such is a sketch of the facts known to the ancients respecting metals. They knew the six malleable metals which are still in common use, and applied them to most of the purposes to which the modems apply them. Scarcely any information has been left us of the methods employed by them to reduce these metals from their ores. But unless the ores were of a much simpler nature than the modern ores of . these metals, of which we have no evidence, tha smelting processes with which the ancients were fami- liar, could scarcely have been contrived without a knowledge of the substances united with the different metals in their ores, and of the means by which these foreign bodies could be separated, and the metals isor lated from all impurities. This doubtless implied a* certain quantity of chemical knowledge, which having been handed down to the moderns, served as a fbunda-' tion upon which the modern science of chemistry was

«

♦ ncpiTwvXjiOwvjC.Tl,

CHEMISTRY or ■TflE AVPJSItTS.

71

p;adually reared : at the same time it will be admitted that this foundation was very slender, and would of itself have led to little. Most of the oxides, sul- phurets, &c., and almost all the salts into which these metallic bodies enter, were unknown to the ancients. Besides the wockiog in metals there were some olher branches of industry practised by the ancients, so in- timately connected with chemical science, that it would be improper to pass them over in silence. The ~ important of these are the following :

w

I, COLOURS USED BY PAINTERS,

s well known that the ancient Grecian artists carried the art of painting lo the highest degree of perfection, and that their paintings were admired and sought after by the most eminent and accomplished men of antiquity ; and Pliny gives us a catalogue of a great number of lirst-rate pictures, and a historical account of a vast many celebrated painters of anti- quity. In his own time, he says, the art of painting had lost its importance, statues and tablets having came in place of pictures.

Two kinds of colours were employed by the an- cients : namely, the florid and the austere. The florid Golotin, as enumerated by Pliny, were minium, arme- nium, cinnaberis, ckrysocotla, purpurissuin, and jn- (Knun pvrpurtMu m .

The word minium aa used by Pliny means red lead: tbough Dioscorides employs it for bisulphutet of mercury or cinnabar. ATmenium was obviously an ochre, probably of a 1 yellow or orange colour.

I Mimaberis was bisulphuret of mercury, which is

I Vrown to have a scarlet colour. Dioscorides employs

' it lo denote a vegetable red colour, probably similar to

tlit^ resin at presen. called dragon's blood.

ChnfsocoUa was a green -col cured paint, and iioicv

78 HISTOHY or CHEHISTET^

Plmy'fl description of it, could have been nothing elM than carbonate of copper or malachite.

Purpurissum was a lake, as is obyious fix>m the account of its formation given by Pliny. The colour-* ing matter is not specified, but from the term used there can be little doubt that it was the liquor frcmi the shellfish that yielded the celebrated purple dye of the Tynans.

Indicum purpurissum was probably indigo. This might be implied from the account of it gi^en by Pliny.

The austere colours used by the ancient painters were of two kinds, native and artificial. The native were siriopis, rubrica, parcRtonium, melinum, eretria, auripigmentum. The artificial were, ochra, cerussel . usta, sandaracha, sandy x, syricum, atramentum,

Sinopis is the red substance now knovm by the name of reddle, and used for marking. On that ac« count it is sometimes called red chalk. It was found in Pontus, in the Balearian islands, and in Egypt. The price was three denarii, or Is, lljrf. the pound weight. The most famous variety of sinopis was from the isle of Lemnos ; it was sold sealed and stamped : hence it was called sphragis. It was em- ployed to adulterate minium. In medicine it wai used to appease infiammation, and as an antidote to poison.

Ochre is merely sinopis heated in a covered vessel. The higher the temperature to which it has been ex- posed the better it is.

Leucophorum is a compound of

' 6 lbs. sinopis of Pontus, C

10 lbs. siris, ';.

2 lbs. melinum, <

triturated together for thirty days. It was used t^

make gold adhere to wood. \'

Rubrica from the name, was probably a red ochres

JParatonivm was a white colour, so called frcMn a

CHEXISTItT OF THE AKCISirrS. 79

pktee'in l^ypt^ where it was founds It was obtained also in the island of Crete, and in Cyrene. It wa* said to be a combination of the froth of the sea con- solidated with mud. It consisted probably of car- bonate of lime. Six pounds of it cost only one denarius.

Melinum was also a white-coloured powder found In Melos and Samos in yeins. It was most probably a carbonate of lime.

Eretria was named from the place where it was found. Pliny gives its medical properties, but does not inform us of its colour. It is impossible to say what it was.

- Auripigmentttm was yellow sulphuret of arsenic. It was probably but little used as a pigment by the ancient painters.

Cerussa usta was red lead.

Sandaracha was red sulphuret of arsenic. The pound of sandaracha cost 5 as. : it was imitated by red lead. Both it and ochra were found in the island Topazos in the Red Sea.

Sandy X was made by torrefying equal parts of true sandaracha and sinopis. It cost half the price of san- daracha. Virgil mistook this pigment for a plant, as is obvious from the following line :

Sponte sua sandix, pascentes vestiet agnos.*

Siricum is made by mixing sinopis and sandyx.

Atramentum was obviously from Pliny's account of It lamp-black. He mentions ivory-black as ah in- vention of Apelles : it was called elephantinum. There was a native atramentum, which had the colour of sulphur, and got a black colour artificially. It is not unlikely that it contained sulphate of iron, and that it got Its black colour from the admixture of some astringent substance.

•Bucolir.L45,

80 BIStO&T OF CHEMISTHT.

The ink of the ancients was lamp-black mixed widi water, containing gum or glue dissolved in it. Atrm^ mentum indicum was the same as our China ink.

The purpurissum was a high-priced pigment, h was made by putting creta argentaria (a species <rf white clay) into the caldrons containing the ingfOM dienU for dying purple. The creta imbibed the purpli colour and became purpurissum. The first portion cl creta put in constituted the finest and highest-pricat pigment. The portions put in afterws^s becam successively worse, and were, of consequence loww priced. We see, from this description, that it was^ lake similar to our modem cochineal lakes.* tr

That the purpurissum indicum was indigo is ok vious from the statement of Pliny, that when thiuwj upon hot coals it gives out a beautiful purple flanMi This constitutes the character of indigo. Its price m Pliny's time was ten denarii, or six shillings and fivfr pence halfpenny the Roman pound ; which is equifti lent to 85. l\d, the avoirdupois. --^

Though few or none of the ancient pictures hMi been preserved, yet several specimens of the co' used by them still remain in Rome and in the ru Herculaneum. Among others the fresco pain in the baths of Titus, still remain ; and as liiese made for a Roman emperor, we might expect to the most beautiful and costly colours employed them. These paints, and some others, were examin by Sir Humphrey Davy, in 1813, while he wat Rome. From his researches we derive some pi accurate information respecting the colours emp by the painters of Greece and Rome.

1 . Red paints* Three different kinds of red found in a chamber opened in 1811, in the bat] Titus, namely, a bright orange red, a dull red,

brown red. The bright orange red was miniumy,^

.- — .i

* Plinu HiBt, Nat. wxv. 6, M

CHSMISTKT OF THK AUCIEVTS. 81

ftd lead; the other two were merely two varieties of iron ochres, Ancpther still brighter red was obsen-ed on the walls; it proved, on examination, to be vermi- lion or cinnabar.

2. Yellow painlg. All the yellows examined by Davy proved to be iron ochres, sometimes mixed with a little red lead. Orpimeat wns undoubtedly em- ployed, as is obvious from what Pliny says on the subject : but Davy found no traces of it among the yellow colours which he examined. A very deep yellow, approaching orange, which covered a piece of stucco in the ruins near the monument of Caius Ces- tius, proved to be protoxide of lead, or massicot, mixed with some red lead. The yellows in the Aldo- brandini pictures were all ochres, and so were those in the pictures on the walls of the houses at Pompeii.

3. Blue paints. Different shades of blues are used in the different apartments of the baths of Titus, which are darker or lighter, as they contain more or less carbonate of lime with which the blue pigment bad been mixed by the painter. This blue pigment turned out, on examination, to be a frit composed of alkali and

I silica, fused togetherwithacertainquantityofoxideof I copper. Thiswas the colour called xifvoe (chianoi) by the Greeks, and cmruleum by the Romans. Vitru- I *ius gives the method of preparing it by heating I strongly together sand, carbonate of soda, and tilings I of copper. Davy found that fifteen parts by weight I of anhydrous carbonate of soda, twenty parts of pow- dered Opaque flints, and three parts of copper filings, I nrongly heated together for two hours, gave a sub- stance exactly similar to the blue pigment of the t ancients, and which, when powdered, produced a fine deep blue colour. This ceeruleum has the advantage of remaining unaltered even when the painting is exposed to the actions of the air and sun.

There is reason lo suspect, from what Vitruvius and Pliny say, that glass rendered blue by means ot cq-

VOl. J. - o

83 mSTO&T Of CHEinSTET.

bait constituted the basis of some of the blue pigments of the ancients ; but all those examined by Davy con« sisted. of glass tinged blue by copper, without any trace of cobalt whatever.

' 4. Oreen paints. All the green paints examined by Davy proved to be carbonates of copper, more or less mixed with carbonate of lime. I have already men* tioned that verdigris was known to the ancients. It was no doubt employed by them as a pigment, though it is not probable that the acetic acid would be able to withstand the action of the atmosphere for a couple of thousand years.

5. Purple paints, Davy ascertained that the colour- ing matter of the ancient purple was combustible. > It did not give out the smell of ammonia, at least per- ceptibly. There is little doubt that it was the pwrpfu^ rissum of the ancients, or a clay coloured by means of the purple of the buccinum employed by the Syrians in the celebrated purple dye.

6. Black and brown paints. The black paints were lamp-black : the browns were some of them ochres and some of them oxides of manganese.

7. White paints. All the ancient white paints ex- amined by Davy were carbonates of lime.* We know from Pliny that white lead was employed by the ancients as a pigment ; but it might probably become altered in its nature by long-continued exposure to the weather.

Ill, — GLASS.

It is admitted by some that the word which in our English Bible is translated crystal, means glass, in the following passage of Job : *' The gold and the crystal cannot equal it."t Now although the exaet time when Job was written is not known, it is admitted on all hands to be one of the oldest of the books cott

♦ Pba.' Trans. 18U, p. 97. -V Job xxnii. 17

CHSHIST&T Of THE AVCIEITTS. 8S

led in the Old Testament. There are strong; reai^^ s for believing that it existed before the time of sea ; and some go so far as to affirm that there are 3ral allusions to it in the writings of Moses. If refore glass were known when the Book of Job was tten, it is obvious that the discovery of it preoeded commencement of history. But even though tht d used in Job should not refer to glass, there can QO doubt that it was known at a very early period ; glass beads are frequently found on the Egyptian tnmieSy and they are known to have bfden embalmed very remote period. The first Greek author who usee word glass (voXoc, hyalos) is Aristophanes. In his ledy of The Clouds, act ii. scene 1, in the ridicu- 3 dialogue between Socrates and Strepsiades, the er announces a method which had occurred to him >ay his debts. " You know," says he, " the beautiM laparent stone used for kindling fire." '' Do you wa glass (rov tioXov, ton AyaZon)?" replied Socrates. '< I " was the answer. He then describes how he would troy the writings by means of it, and thus defraud creditors. Now this comedy was acted about four idred and twenty-three years before the beginning the Christian era. The story related by Pliuy, re- cting the discovery of this beautiful and important •stance, is well known. Some Phoenician merchants, a ship loaded with carbonate of soda from Egypt, pped, and went ashore on the banks of the river us : having nothing to support their kettles while y were dressing their food, they employed lumps of bonate of soda for that purpose. The fire was mg enough to fuse some of this soda, and to unite •rith the fine sand of the river Belus: the conse- ince of this was the formation of glass.* Whether ) story be entitled to credit or not, it is clear that

* Plinii Hist. Nat. xxzvi. 26. G 2

84 HISTOUT OF CHEMISTBY.

the discovery must have originated in some such acd- dent. Pliny's account of the manufacture of glass/ like his account of every other manufacture, is very imper* feet : but we see from it that in his time they were in the habit of making coloured glasses ; that colourless glasses were most highly prized, and that glass was rendered colourless ^cn as it is at present, by the addition of a certain quantity of oxide of manganese. Colourless glass was very high priced in Pliny's time. He relates, that for two moderate-sized colourless drinking-glasses the Emperor Nero paid 6000 sistertii, .. which is equivalent to 25Z. of our money.

Pliny relates the story of the man who brought ft vessel of malleable glass to the Emperor Tiberius, and who, after dimpling it by dashing it against the floor, restored it to its original shape and beauty by means of a hammer ; Tiberius, as a reward for this important discovery, ordered the artist to be executed, in order, as he alleged, to prevent gold and silver from becom-* ing useless. But though Pliny relates this story, it is evident that he does not give credit to it ; nor does it tleserve credit. We can assign no reason why mal* leable substances may not be transparent ; but all of them hitherto known are opaque. Chloride of silver, chloride of lead and iron constitute no exception, for they are not malleable, though by peculiar contrivancec < they may be extended ; and their transparency is very imperfect. >

Many specimens of the coloured glasses made hf the ancients still remain, particularly the beads em* ployed as ornaments to the Egyptian mummies. Of these ancient glasses several have been examined cbet mically by Klaproth, Hatchett, and some other indi* viduals, in order to ascertain the substances employed to give colour to the glass. The following are tibii facts that have been ascertained :

1. Red glass. This glass was opaque, and of ^

CHEMISTRY OF THE AKCIEKTS. 85

lively copper-red colour. It was probably the kind of red glass to which Pliny gave the name of heematinon* Klaproth analyzed it, and obtained from 100 grains of it the following constituents :

Silica 71

Oxide of lead 10

Oxide of copper ..... 7*5

Oxide of iron 1

Alumina 2*5

lime 1*5

93-5* No doubt the deficiency was owing to the presence of an alkali. From this analysis we see that the colour* ing matter of this glass was red oxide of copper,

2. Green glass. The colour was light verdigris- green, and the glass, like the preceding, was opaque* The constituents from 100 grains were,

Silica 65

Black oxide of copper . . 10 •

Oxide of lead 7-5

Oxide of iron 3*5

Lime 6'5

Alumina ...... 5*5

98-Ot Thus it appears that both the red and green glass are composed of the same ingredients, though in different proportions. Both owe their colour to copper. The red glass is coloured by the red oxide of that metal ; the green by the black oxide, which forms green- coloured compounds, with various acids, particularly with carbonic acid and with silica.

3. Blue glass. The variety analyzed by Klaproth had a sapphire-blue colour^ and was only translucent

•

• Beitrage, vi. 140. f Ibid., p. 142.

i6 filSTOllY OP CHEMISTRY.

on the edges. The constituents from 100 grains of it

were,

SUica 81-5

Oxide of iron • • • • • 9* 5 Alumina ..•»•• 1* 5 Oxide of copper . • » • 0* 5 Lime 0-25

93-26

From this analysis it appears that the colouring matter of this glass was oxide of iron : it was therefore ana- logous to the lapis lazuli, or ultramarine, in its nature.

Davy, as has been formerly noticed, found anothef blue glass, or frit, coloured by means of copper ; and he showed that the blue paint of the ancients wai often made from this glass, simply by grinding it to powder.

Klaproth could find no cobalt in the blue glasi^ which he examined ; but Davy found the transparent blue glass vessels, which are along with the vases, in the tombs of Magna Graecia, tinged with cobalt ; and he found cobalt in all the transparent ancient blue glasses with which Mr, Millingen supplied him. The mere fusion of these glasses with alkali, and subse-> quent digestion of the product with muriatic acid, was sufficient to produce a sympathetic ink from them, f The transparent blue beads which occasionally adoriC the Egyptian mummies have also been examined, and found coloured by cobalt. The opaque glass beads are all tinged by means of oxide of copper. It it probable from this that all the transparent blue glassel of the ancients were coloured by cobalt ; yet we find no allusion to cobalt in any of the ancient authoitl Theophrastus says that copper {x*^\i^og, chalcos) was used to give glass a fine colour. Is it not likely that the imrt

» Beitrage, p. 144. f PhU. Trans. 1815, p. 108. ' "

CHSHXSTaT OF THE AVCUSSTB. 8Y

pure oiide of cobalt, in the state in which they nsed it, was confounded by them with xaXicoc (chalcos) ?

IV. — VASA MUaRHINA.

The Romans obtained from the east, and particu* larly from Egypt, a set of vessels which they distin* guished by the name of vasa murrhina, and which were held by them in very high estimation. They were never Isu'ger than to be capable of containinff frcmi about thirty-six to forty cubic inches. One of the largest size cost, in tlie time of Pliny, about 7000/* Nero actually gave for one 3000Z. They began to be known in Rome about the latter days of the republic* The first six ever seen in Rome were sent by Pompey from the treasures of Mithridates. They were depo* sited in the temple of Jupiter in the capitol. Augus- tus, after the battle of Actium, brought one of these vessels from Egypt, and dedicated it also to the gods. In Nero's time they began to be used by private per- sons ; and were so much coveted that Petronius, the favourite of that tyrant, being ordered for execution, and conceiving that his death was owing to a wish of Nero to get possession of a vessel of this kind which he had, broke the vessel in pieces in order to prevent Nero from gaining his object.

There appear to have been two kinds of these vasa murrhina ; those that came from Asia, and those that were made in Egypt. The latter were much more common, and much lower priced than the former, as appears from various passages in Martial and Pro- pertius.

Many attempts have been made, and much learning displayed by the modems to determine the nature of these celebrated vessels ; but in general these attempts were made by individuals too little acquainted with chemistry and with natural history in general to qualify them for researches of so difficult a nature. Some will have it that they consisted of a kind of gum ;

88 HISTORY OF CUEUISTBrT*

Others that they were made of glass ; others, of a par-*' ticular kind of shell. Cardan and Scaliger assure us that they were porcelain vessels ; and this opinion was adopted likewise by Whitaker, who supported it with his usual violence and arrogance. Many conceive them to have been made of some precious stone, some that they were of obsidian ; Count de Veltheim thinks that they were made of the Chinese agalmatolite^ or Jigure stone ; and Dr. Hager conceives that they were made fi'om the Chinese stone yu. Bruckmann was of opinion that these vessels were made of sardonyx, and the Abb4 Winckelmann joins him in the same con- clusion.

Pliny informs us that these vasa murrhina were formed from a species of stone dug out of the earth in Parthia, and especially in Carimania, and also in other places but little known.* They must have been very abundant at Rome in the time of Nero ; for Pliny informs us that a man of consular rank, famous for his collection of vasa murrhina, having died, Nero forcibly deprived his children of these vessels, and they were so numerous that they filled the whole inside of a theatre, which Nero hoped to have seen .filled with Romans when he came to it to sing in public. *

It is clear that the value of these vessels depended on their size. Small vessels bore but a small price, while that of large vessels was very high; this shows us thai; it must have been difficult to procure a block of the stone out of which they were cut, of a size sufficiently great to make a large vessel.

These vessels were so soft that an impression migfak be made upon them with the teeth; for Pliny relataf the story of a man of consular rank, who drank out m one, and was so enamoured with it that he bit pieoee out of the lip of the cup : " Potavit ex eo ante boi annos consularis, ob amorem abraso ejus margine^lf

• FUnu Hist. Nat. xxsvii. 2.

^^

ClIEMlSTflV OF THE ANCIENTS.

And what is sin^lar, the value of the cup, so far from being injured by tliia abrasure, was augmented : " ut tamen injuria ilia pretium augeret; neque est hodie murrhini alteriua prsstantior indicatura."* It is clear from this that the matter of these vessels was neither rock crystal, agate, nor any precious stone whatever, all of which are too hard to admit of an impression from the teeth of a man.

The lustre was vitreous to such a degree that the name vitrum miiTrhinum was given to the artificial fabric, in Egypt.

The splendour was not very great, for Pliny ob- serves, " Splendor his sine viribus nitorque verius quam splendor."

The colours, from their depth and richness, werewhat gave these vessels theit value and excited admiration. The principal colours were purple and white, disposed in undulating bands, and usually separated by a third band, in which the two colours being mixed, assumed the tint of flame : " Sed in pretio varietas colorum, subinde circumagentibus se maculis in purpuram can- doremque, et tertiuin ex utroque ignescentem, velut per transitum coloris, purpura rubescente, aut lacte candescente."

Perfect transparency was considered as a defect, they were merely translucent; this we learn not merely frora Pliny, but from the following epigram of IWartial :

Nob bibimus vitro, tu tnurrH, Pantice : qunre ? Prodat perBpicuus ne duo vinacalix,

Some specimens, and they were the most valued, ex- hibited a play of colour like the rainbow: Pliny says ihey were very commonly spotted with " sales, verrucse- que non eminentes, sed iit in cprpore etiam plerumque sessiles." TTiis, no doubt, refers to foreign bodies, such as grains of pyrites, antimony, galena, ic,

• Plibu £U«t. Nat, zzzvii. 2.

90 HI8T0UT OF CHEMIST&T.

which were often scattered through the substance of which the vessels were made.

Such are all the facts respecting the vasa murrhinft to be found in the writings of the ancients ; they all apply to fluor spar, and to nothing else; but to it they apply so accurately as to leave little doubt that they were in reality vessels of fluor spar, similar to those at present made in Derbyshire.*

The artificial vasa murrhina made at Thebes, in Egypt, were doubtless of glass, coloured to imi- tate fluor spar as much as possible, and having tha semi-transparency which distinguishes that mineral. The imitations being imperfect, these factitious vessels were not much prized nor sought after by the Romans^ they were rather distributed among the Arabians and Ethiopians, who were supplied with glass from Egypt.

Rock crystal is compared by Pliny with the stonft from which the vasa murrhina were made ; the former, in his opinion, had been coagulated by cold, the lattet by heat. Though the ancients, as we have seen, were acquainted with the method of colouring glass, yet they prized colourless glass highest on account of its resemblance to rock crystal; cups of it, in Pliny's time, had supplanted those of silver and gold ; Nero gave for a crystal cup 150,000 sistertii, or 625/.

V. — DYEING AND CALlCO-PRINTlNG.

Very little has been handed down by the ancients respecting the processes of dyeing. It is evident, from Pliny, that they were acquainted with madder, an4 that preparations of iron were used in the black dyes# The most celebrated dye of all, the purple, was dis^^

* This opinion was first formed by Baron Bom, and ttaltd in his Catalogue of Minerals in M. E. Raab's collection, i. 35S. But the evidences in favour of it have been brought fbrwftffdl with great clearness and force by M. Roziere. See Jour, de Mln, xzzvi. 193,

CHBMMTRT 07 TBB AVCIXKTS. 91

covered hy the Tyrians about fifteen centuries before the Christian era. This colour was given by varioua kinds of shellfish which inhabit the Mediterranean* Pliny divides them into two genera; the first, compre- hending the smaller species, he called buccinunif from their resemblance to a hunting-horn ; the second, in-* eluded those called purpura : Fabius Columna thinktt that these were distinguished also by the name of murex.

These shellfish yielded liquor of different shades of colour ; they were often mixed in various proportions to produce particular shades of colour. One, or at most two drops of this liquor were obtained from each fish^ by extracting and opening a little reservoir placed in the throat. To avoid this trouble, the smaller spe- cies were generally bruised whole, in a mortar; this was also frequently done with the large, though the other liquids of the fish must have in some degree in-* jured the colour. The liquor, when extracted, was mixed with a considerable quantity of salt to keep it from putrifying ; it was then diluted with five or six times as much water, and kept moderately hot in leaden or tin vessels, for eight or ten days, during which the liquor was often skimmed to separate all the impurities. After this, the wool to be dyed, being first well washed, was immersed and kept therein for five hours; then taken out, cooled, and again im- mersed, and continued in the liquor till all the colour Was exhausted.*

To produce particular shades of colour, carbonate of soda, urine, and a marine plant called /ucws, were occasionally added : one of these colours was a very dark reddish violet—" Nigramtis rosee colore sub- luQens.''t ^u^ the most esteemed, and that in which the Tyrians particularly excelled, resembled coagulat-

• FUnii Hist. Nat. ix. 38. f Ibid., ix. 35.

;

9i HISTORY OF CHEMIStRY.

ed blood — " laus ei summa in colore sanguinis con- creti, nigricans aspectu, idemque suspectu reful- gens."*

Pliny says that the Tyrians first dyed their wool in the liquor of the purpura, and afterwards in that of the buccinum ; and it is obvious from Moses that this purple was known to the Egyptians in his time.f Wool which had received this double Tyrian dye (dia hapha) was so very costly that, in the reign of Augustus, it sold for about 36/. the pound. But lest tins should not be sufficient to exclude all from the use of it but those invested with the very highest dignities of the state, laws were made inflicting severe penalties, and even death, upon all who should presume to wear it under the dignity of an emperor. The art of dyeing this colour came at length to be practised by a few in- dividuals only, appointed by the emperors, and having been interrupted about the beginning of the twelfth century all knowledge of it died away, and during several ages this celebrated dye was considered and lamented as an irrecoverable loss.| How it was afterwards recovered and made known by Mr. Cole, of Bristol, M. Jussieu, M. Reaumur, and M. Duhamel, would lead us too far from our present object, were we to relate it : those who are interested in the subject will find an historical detail in Bancroft's work on Perma* nent Colours, just referred to.

There is reason to suspect that the Hebrew word trans- lated j^ne linen in the Old Testament, and so celebnited: as a production of Egypt, was in reality cottony and no£' linen. From a cunous passage in Pliny, there if reason to believe that the Egyptians in his time, and' probably long before, were acquainted with the method of calico-printing, such as is still practised in IndiS:

•»

* Plmii Hist. Nat. iz. c. 38. f Exodus zxr. 4.

t See Bancroft on Permanent Colours, i. 79. .

CHEMISTRY OP TUB AVCIEKTK. 93

and the east. The following ia a literal tniDsIation of the passage in question:

•■ There exists in Egypt awonderful method of dyeing. The white cloth is stained in various places, not with dye stuffs, but with substances which have the pro- perty of absorbing {fixing) colours, these applcations are not visible upon the cloth; but when they are dipped into a hot caldron of the dye they are drawn out an instant after dyed. The remarkable circumstance is, thai though there be only one dye in the vat, yet dif- ferent colours appear upon the cloth ; nor can the colour be afterwards removed."*

It is evident enough that these substances applied were different mordants which served to fix the dye upon the cloth ; the nature of these mordants cannot be discovered, as nothing specific seems to have been known to Pliny. The modern mordants are solutions of alumina; of the oxide of tin, oxide of iron, oxide of lead. Sea.: and doubtless these, or something equi- valent to these, were the substances employed by the ancients. The purple dye required no mordant, it fixed itself to the cloth in consequence of the chemical affinity which existed between them. Whether in- digo was used by the ancients as a dye does not ap- pear, but there can be no doubt, at least, that its use waa known to the Indians at a very remote period.

From these facts, few as they are, there can be little doubt that dyeing, and even calico-printing, had made considerable progress among the ancients ; and this could not have taken place without a considerable knowledge of colouring matters, and of the mordants by which these colouring matters were fixed. These facts, however, were probably but imperfectly under- stood, and could not be the means of furnishing the ancients with any accurate chemical knowledge.

• Plinii Hist. NM. xwr.; H.

04 BISTO&T OF CHEHISTftT.

VI. — SOAP.

Soap, which constitutes so important and indis- pensable an article in the domestic economy of the modems, was quite unknown to the ancient inhabitants of Asia, and even of Greece. No allusion to it occurs in the Old Testament. In Homer, we find Nausicaa^ the daughter of the King of the Phseacians, using nothing but water to wash her nuptial garments:

They seek the cisterns where Pheacian dmmes

Wash their fair garments in the limped Btreams ;^.

Where ^thering into depth from falling riUs^

The lucid wave a spacious bason fills.

The mules nnhamess'd range beside the main.

Or crop the verdant herbage of the plain.

Then emulous the royal robes they Iwne,

And plunge the vestures in the deanshig ware. "*

Odnuey^ vi. L 99.

We find, in some of the comic poets, that the Greeks were in the habit of adding wood-ashes to water to make it a better detergent. Wood-ashes contain a certain portion of carbonate of potash, which of course would answer as a detergent; though, from its caustic qualities, it would be injurious to the hands of the | washerwomen. There is no evidence that carbonate of soda, the nitrum of the ancients, was ever used as a detergent ; this is the more surprising, because we know from Pliny that it was employed in dyeing, and one cannot see how a solution of it could be employed by the dyers in their processes without discovering that it acted powerfully as a detergent.

The word soap (sapo) occurs first in Pliny. He in- forms us that it was an invention of the Gauls, who employed it to render their hair shining ; that it was a compound of wood-ashes and tallow, that there wen two kinds of it, hard and soft {spissus et liquidtis); and that the best kind was made of the ashes of the beech and the fat of goats. Among the Germans

CHBHISTRT OF THE AKCIEHTS. 95

it was more employed by the men than the women.* It is curious that no allusion whatever is made by Pliny to the use of soap as a detergent ; shall we con- elude from this that the most important of all the uses of soap was unknown to the ancients?

It was employed by the ancients as a pomatum ; and, during the early part of the government of the emperors, it was imported into Rome from Germany, as a pomatum for the young Roman beaus. Beck- mann is of opinion that the Latin word sapo is de- rived from the old German word sepe, a word still employed by the common people of Scotland.f

It is well known that the state of soap depends upon the alkali employed in making it. Soda constitutes a hard soap, and potash a soft soap. The ancients be- ing ignorant of the difference between the two alka- lies, and using wood-ashes in the preparation of it, doubtless formed soft soap. The addition of some common salt, during the boiling of the soap, would convert the soft into hard soap. As Pliny informs us that the ancients were acquainted both with hard and eoft soap, it is clear that they must have followed some such process.

VII. — STARCH.

The manufacture of .starch was known to the an- cients. Pliny informs iis that it was made from wheat and from siligo, which was probably a variety or sub- species of wheat. The invention of starch is ascribed by Pliny to the inhabitants of the island of Chio, where in his time the best starch was still made. Pliny's de- scription of the method employed by the ancients of

» Plinii Hist. Nat. xxviii. 12. The passage of Pliny is as follows : " Prodest et sapo ; Gallorurahoc inventum rutilandis capillis ex sevo et cinere. Optimiis fagino et caprino, duobus modis, spissus et liquidus : uterque apud Germanos majore ^ia iisu viris quam feminis."

t Hist, of Inventions, iii» 239^

96 HI8T0BT OF CHBMISTBY*

making starch is tolerably exact. Next to the ChiaQ starch that of Crete was most celebrated ; uid next to it was the Egyptian. The qualities of starch were judged of by the weight ; the lightest being always reckoned the best.

VIII. BEER.

That the ancients were acquainted with wine is universally known. This knowledge must have been - nearly coeval with the origin of society ; for we are informed in Genesis that Noah, after the flood, planted a vineyard, and made wine, and got in- toxicated by drinking the liquid which he had manu- factured.* Beer also is a very old manufacture. It was in common use among the Egyptians in the time of Herodus, who informs us that they made use of a kind of wine made from barley, because no vines grew in their country.f Tacitus informs us, that in his time it was the drink of the Germans.^ Pliny in- forms us that it was made by the Grauls, and by other nations. He gives it tlie name ofcerevisia or cervisia; • the name obviously alluding to the grain from which it was made.

But though the ancients seem acquainted with both wine and beer, there is no evidence of their having ever subjected these liquids to distillation, and of having collected the products. This would have fur- nished them with ardent spirits or alcohol, of which there is every reason to believe they were entirely ig- norant. Indeed, the method employed by Dioscorideis to obtain mercury from cinnabar, is a sufficient proof that the true process of distillation was unknown tQ them. He mixed cinnabar with iron filings, put the

* Genesis ix. 20.

•f "Oivifi ^ Ik KpiOiuv ireTToirifisvtfi Siaxpiovrai* 6v yap <r^ nn Iv ry x^PV o.fnrfkou Euterpe chap. 77.

X De Moribus Germanorum, c. 23. '' Potui humor ex hordu Aut frumenU) ia quandam similitudinem vini corruptus."

CHEMISTRY 0? THE ANCIEKTS. 97

siixtTire into a pot, to the top of which a cover of stone- ware was luted. Heat was applied to the pot, and when the process was at an end, the mercury was found adhering to the inside of the cover. Had they been aware of the method of distilling the quicksilver ore into a receiver, this imperfect mode of collecting only a small portion of the quicksilver, separated from the cinnabar, would never have been practised. Be« sides, there is not the smallest allusion to ardent spirits, either in the writings of the poets, historians, natu- ralists, or medical men of ancient Greece; a cir- cumstance not to be accounted for had ardent spirits been known, arid applied even to one- tenth of the uses to which they are put by the moderns.

IX. STONEWARE.

The manufacture of stoneware vessels was known at a very early period of society. Frequent allusions to the potter's wheel occur in the Old Testament, showing that the manufacture must have been familiar to the Jewish nation. The porcelain of the Chinese boasts of a very high antiquity indeed. We cannot doubt that the processes of the ancients were similar to those of the modems, though I am not aware of any tolerably ac- curate account of them in any ancient author what- ever.

Moulds of plaster of Paris were used by the ancients to take casts precisely as at present.*

The sand of Puzzoli was used by the Romans, as it is by the moderns, to form a mortar capable of hardening under water.

Pliny gives us some idea of the Roman bricks, which are known to have been of an excellent quality. There were three sizes of bricks used by the Romans.

1. Lydian, which were IJ foot long and 1 foot broad.

* Plinii HisCNat. xxxv. 12.

VOL, If II

9S HISTORY OP CHEMIBTaT*

2. Tetradoron, which was a square of 16 inehes each side.

3. Pentadoron, which was a square, each side of which was 20 inches long.

Doron signifies the palm of the hand : of course it was equivalent to 4 inches.

X.— PHECIOUS STONES AKD MINERALS.

Pliny has given a pretty detailed description of thel precious stones of the ancients ; but it is not very ea&y to determine the specific minerals to which he al-> ludes.

1 . The description of the diamond is tolerably pre^ cise. It was found in Ethiopia, India, Arabia, and Macedonia. But tiie Macedonian diamond, as well as the adamas cyprius and siderites, were obviously ' not diamonds, but soft stones.

2. The emerald of the ancients (smaragdus) must have varied in its nature. It was a green, transparent, hard stone ; and, as colour was the criterion by which • the ancients distinguished minerals and divided them into species, it is obvious that very different minerals •' must have been confounded together, under the name.- '■ of emerald . Sapphire , beryl , doubtless fluor spar whea - J green, and probably even serpentine, nephrite, an& < some ores of copper, seem to have occasionally got the ^ same name. There is no reason to believe that theT emerald of the modems was known before the discoC very of America. At least it has been only found in modern times in America. Some of the emeralds dttf scribed by Pliny as losing their colour by exposure tPi the sun, must have been fiuor spars. There is a re^ markably deep and beautiful green fluor spar, isM with some years ago in the county of Durham, in oqifc of the Weredale mines that possesses this property. The emeralds of the ancients were of such a size (1^

feet^ laige enough to be cut into a pillar), that we calD

:v

CHSMISTRT 07 THE AKCIEKTS* 99

consider them in no other light than as a species of rock.

3. Topaz of the ancients had a green colour , which is never the case with the modem topaz. It was found in the island Topazios, in the Red Sea.* It is generztlly supposed to have been the chrysolite of tlie modems. But Pliny mentions a statue of it six feet long. Now chrysolite never occurs in such large masses. Bmce mentions a green substance in an emerald island in the Red Sea, not harder than glass. Might not this be the emerald of the ancients ?

4. Calais y from the locality and colour was pro- bably the Persian turquoise, as it is generally sup- posed to be.

5. Whether the prasius and chrysoprasius of Pliny were the modern stones to which these names are given, we have no means of determining. It is generally supposed that they are, and we have no evidence to the contrary.

6. The chrysolite of Pliny is supposed to be our topaz : but we have no other evidence of tliis than the opinion of M. Du Terns.

7. Asteria of Pliny is supposed by Saussure to be our sapphire. The lustre described by Pliny agrees with this opinion. The stone is said to have been very hard and colourless.

8. Opalus seems to have been our opal. It is called, Pliny says, pcederos by many, on account of its beauty. The Indians called it sangenon,

9. Obsidian was the same as the mineral to which we give that name. It was so called because a Roman named Obsidianus first brought it from Egypt. I have a piece of obsidian, which the late Mr. Salt brought from the locality specified by Pliny, and which possesses all the characters of that mineral in its purest state.

* The word topazo is said by Pliny to signify, in the language of the Troglodytes, to seek,

H 2

loo HISTORY OF CHBMISTEY.

10. Sarda was the name of cameluJa/iy so called be- cause it was first found near Sardis. The sardonyx was also another name for camelian,

1 1 . Onyx was a name sometimes given to a rock j gypsum ; sometimes it ¥ras a light-coloured chalcedony » The Latin name for chalcedony was carchedonius, so called because Carthage was the place where this mineral was exposed to sale. The Greek name for Carthage was iLapxn^**^ (carchedon),

12. Carbunculus was the garnet; and anthrax was a name for another variety of the same mineral.

13. The oriental amethyst of Pliny was probably a sapphire. The fourth species of amethyst described by Pliny, seems to have been our amethyst. Pliny derives the name from « and (a) ^vOi| (mythe)y wine, because it has not quite the colour of wine. But the common derivation is from a and /Av9tm, to intoxicatey because it was used as an amulet to prevent intoxication.

14. The sapphire is described by Pliny as alway* opaque^ and as unfit for engraving on. We do not know what it was.

15. The hyacinth of Pliny is equally unknowa* From its name it was obviously of a blue colour. Oar hvacinth has a reddish-brown colour, and a great detl . o^ hardness and lustre.

16. The cyan us of Pliny may have been our eyamUe*

1 7 . Astrios agrees very well, as far as the description • of Pliny goes, with the variety of telspar called mith laria. c*

18. Belioculus seems to have been our catseye. .

19. Lychnites was a violet-coloured stone, wkirfl became electric by heat. Unless it was a bhie lim^' maliny 1 do not know what it could be. . •:

20. The jasper of the ancients was probably As same as ours. t

2 1 . Molochites may have been our malachite. name comes fin>m the Greek word iuu)Xoxir» maUoWy marshmallow*

CHEMlSTttlr Of THE AXClElTTS. 101

: '22. Pliny considers amber as the juice of a tree concreted into a solid form. The largest piece of it that he had ever seen weighed 13 lbs. Roman weight, which is nearly equivalent to 9| lbs. avoirdupois, /n- dian amber, of which he speaks, was probably copal, or some transparent resin. It may be dyed, he says, by means of anchusa and the fat of kids,

23. Lapis specularis was foliated sulphate of lime, or selenite.

24. Pyrites had the same meaning among the an- cients that it has among the moderns ; at least as far as iron pyrites or bisulphuret of iron is concerned. Pliny describes two kind of pyrites ; namely, the white (arsenical pyrites), and tiie yellow (iron py- lites). It was used for striking fire with steel, in order to kindle tinder. Hence the name pyrites or Jirestone.

25. Gagates, from the account given of it by Pliny, was obviously pit-coal or jet.

. 26. Marble had the same meaning among the an- cients that it has among the moderns. It was sawed by the ancients into slabs, and the action of the saw was facilitated by a sand brought for the purpose from Ethiopia and the isle of Naxos. It is obvious that this sand was powdered corundum, or emery.

27. Creta was a name applied by the ancients not only to chalk, but to white clay.

28. Melinum was an oxide of iron. Pliny gives a list of one hundred and fifty-one species of stones in the order of the alphabet. Very few of the minerals contained in this list can be made out. He gives also a list of fifty-two species of stones, whose names are derived from a fancied resemblance which the stones are supposed to bear to certain parts of animals. Of these, also, very few can be made out.

XI. MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS.

The ancients seem to have been ignorant of the na- ture and properties of air^ and of sdl gaseous \)Q^^«

102 HISTORY OP CHEMISTRY.

Pliny's account of air consists of a single senteiide : " Aer densatur nubibus ; furit procellis.'' " Air is condensed in clouds, it rages in storms." Nor is his description of water much more complete, since it con-» sists only of the following phrases : *' Aquse subeunt in imbres, rigescunt in grandines, tumescunt in fluc- tus, prsecipitantur in torrentes.'** "Water falls in showers, congeals in hail, swells in waves, and rushes down in torrents." In the thirty -eighth chapter of the second book, indeed, he professes to treat of air ; but the chapter contains merely an enumeration of me- teorological phenomena, without once touching upon the nature and properties of air.

Pliny, with all the philosophers of antiquity, admit-* ted the existence of the four elements, fire, air, water, and earth ; but though he enumerates these in the fifth chapter of his first book, he never attempts to explain their nature or properties. Earth, among the ancients, had two meanings, namely, the planet on which we live, and the soil upon which vegetables grow. Thess two meanings still exist in common language. The meaning afterwards given to the term, earth, by the chemists, did not exist in the days of Pliny, or, at least, was unknown to him ; a sufficient proof tiiat chemistry, in his time, had made no progress as a science ; for some notions respecting the properties and constituents of those supposed four elements must have constituted the very foundation of scientific chemistry.

The ancients were acquainted with none of the acidt which at present constitute so numerous a tribe, ex- cept vinegar, or acetic acid ; and even this acid was not known to them in a state of purity. They knew none of the saline bases, except lime, soda, and potaab^ and these very imperfectly. Of course the wholn tribe of salts was unknown to them, except a very few^ which they found ready formed in the earth, or which

• Pliim'Hial.TSat. 11.63.

CHEMISTRY OF THE ANCIBKTS. 103

they succeeded in forming by the action of vinegar on lead and copper. Hence all that extensive and most important branch of chemistry, consisting of the com- binations of the acids and bases, on which scientific chemistry mainly depends, must have been unknown to them.

Sulphur occurring native in large quantities, and being remarkable for its easy combustibility, and its disagreeable smell when burning, was known in the very earliest ages. Pliny describes four kinds of sul- phur, differing from each other, probably, merely in their purity. These were

1 . Sulphur vivum, or apyron. It was dug out of the earth solid, and was doubtless pure, or nearly so. It alone was used in medicine.

2. Gleba — used only by fullers.

3. Egula — ^used also by fullers.

Pliny says, it renders woollen stuffs white and soft. It is obvious from this, that the ancients knew the method of bleaching flannel by the fumes of sulphur, as practised by the modems.

4. The fourth kind was used only for sulphuring matches.

Sulphur, in Pliny*s time, was found Uative in the ^olian islands, and in Campania. It is curious that he never mentions Sicily, whence the great supply is drawn for modem manufacture.

In medicine, it seems to have been only used ex- ternally by the ancients. It was considered as excel- lent for removing emptions. It was used also for fu- migating.

The word alumen^ which we translate alum, occurs often in Pliny ; and is the same substance which the Greeks distinguished by the nameof <rrv?rrijpto(s^y/?^ma). It is described pretty minutely by Dioscorides, and also by Pliny. It was obviously a natural production, dug out of the earth, and consequently quite different from our alum, with which the ascieats were uiiacqvxml^^«

104 HISTORY OF CREMISTET.

Dioscorides says that it was found abundantly ia Egypt ; that it was of various kinds, but that the slaty variety was the best. He mentions also many other localities. He says that, for medical purposes, the most valued of all the varieties of alumen were the slaty, the round, and the liquid. The slaty alumea is very white, has an exceedingly astringent taste, a strong smell, is free from stony concretions, and gradually cracks and emits long capillary crystals irotk these rifts ; on which account it is sometimes called trichiies. This description obviously applies to a kind of slate-clay, which probably contained pyrites mixed with it of the decomposing kind. The capillary cry»A tals were probably similar to those crystals at present called hair-salt by mineralogists, which exude pretM* abundantly from the shale of the coal-beds, when it has been long exposed to the air. Hair-salt difFeii very much in its nature. Klaproth ascertained hf analysis, that the hair-salt from the quicksilver-mindi in luria is sulphate of magnesia, mixed with a small quantity of sulphate of iron.* The hair-salt from the abandoned coal-pits in the neighbourhood of Glasgo# is a double salt, composed of sulphate of alumina, add sulphate of iron, in definite proportions ; the compoii& tion being ^»

1 atom protosulphate of iron, 1^ atom sulphate of alumina, ' i^

15 atoms water. r'/

I suspect strongly that the capillary crystals ii^Qift: the schistose alumen of Dioscorides were nearly of tift same nature. '* ■

From Pliny's account of the uses to which alumij was applied, it is quite obvious that it must Hii varied very much in its nature. Alumen nigrum used to strike a black colour, and must therefore hvigt contained iron. It was doubtless an impure nati

• ^

* Beitrag«, ill. 104. t

I

;

CHEMIST&T 0¥ THE AKCIEKTS. 105

sulphate of iron, similar to many native productions of the same nature still met with in various parts of the world, but not employed ; their use having been su- perseded by various artificial salts, more definite in their nature, and consequently more certain in their application, and at the same time cheaper and more abundant than the native.

. The alumen employed as a mordant by the dyers, must have been a sulphate of alumina more or less pure ; at least it must have been free from all sulphate of iron, which would have affected the colour of the clothy and prevented the dyer from accomplishing his object.*

What the alumen rotundum wb.s, is not easily con- jectured. Dioscorides says, that it was sometimes made artificially ; but that the artificial alumen rotun- dum was not much valued. The best, he. says, was full of air-bubbles, nearly white, and of a very astrin- gent taste. It had a slaty appearance, and was found iu £g3rpt or the Island of Melos.

The liquid alumen was limpid, milky, of an equal colour, free from hard concretions, and having a fiery shade of colour. f In its nature, it was similar to the alumen candidum ; it must therefore have consisted chiefly, at least, of sulphate of alumina.

Bitumen and naphtha were known to the ancients, and used by them to give light instead of oil ; they were employed also as external applications in cases of disease, and were considered as having the same virtues as sulphur. It is said, that the word trans- lated salt in the New Testament — ** Ye are the salt of the earth : but if the salt have lost his savour, where- with shall it be salted ? It is henceforth good for no- thing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot

***^ Quoniam inficiendis claro colore lanis candidum liquidumque ^tUissimuin est, contraque fascia et obscaris nigrum." — P/tmt, iuv. 15.

t See Dioscorides, Jit. r. c. 123. Plinu Hist. Nat, xaw. \^ .

106 filSTO&V OF CHEKlSTEir.

of men"* — ^it is said, that the word salt in this passage refers to asphalt, or bitumen, which was used by the Jews in their sacrifices, and called salt by them. But I have not been able to find satisfactory evidence of the truth of this opinion. It is obvious from the con- text, that the word translated salt could not have had that meaning among the Jews ; because salt never can. be supposed to lose its savour. Bitumen, while liquid, has a strong taste and smell, which it loses gradually by exposure to the air, as it approaches more and more to a solid form.

Asphalt was one of the great constituents of the Greek fire. A great bed of it still existing in Albania, supplied the Greeks with this substance. Concerning the nature of the Greek fire, it is clear that many ex- aggerated and even fabulous statements have been published. The obvious intention of the Greeks be- ing, probably, to make their invention as much dread- ed as possible by their enemies. Nitre was undoubt- edly one of the most important of its constituents ; though no allusion whatever is ever made. We do not know when nitrate of potash, the nitre of the moderns, became known in Europe. It was discovered in the east ; and was undoubtedly known in China and India before the commencement of the Christian era. The property of nitre, as a supporter of combustion, could not have remained long unknown after the dis- covery of the salt. The first person who threw a piece of it upon a red-hot coal would observe it. Accord* ingly we find that its use in fireworks was known very early in China and India ; though its prodigious ex- pansive power, by which it propels buUets with la great and destructive velocity, is a European inyen* tion, posterior to the time of Roger Bacon.

• Matthew r. 13. — " Taiitf tor* ro &\ac nyc 7»7C' ^txv Si f0 SXaQ fuapavBy, iv nvi aXtcrOijo'erat; Ice ot/^cv c^xctfci Vn liJtV fiXtjBtjvai £$(i/^ kqX KaravaTiiadcu *viro ruv dvBpwir(ifv,*[

CHBMISTRT OF THB AKCISVTS. 107

The word nitre (amXhad beefl applied by the an- cients to carbonate of soda, a production of Egypt, where it is still formed from sea-water, by some un-* known process of nature in the marshes near Alexan* dria. This is evident, not merely from the account g^en of it by Dioscorides and Pliny ; for the following passage, firom the Old Testament, shows that it had the same meaning among the Jews : ^^ As he that taketh away a garment in cold weather, is as vinegar upon nitre : so is he that singeth songs to a heavy heart."* Vinegar poured upon saltpetre produces no sensible effect whatever, but when poured upon car- bonate of soda, it occasions an effervescence. When saltpetre came to be imported to Europe, it was natu- ral to give it the same name as that applied to carbo- nate of soda, to which both in taste and appearance it bore some faint resemblance. Saltpetre possessing much more striking properties than carbonate of soda much more attention was drawn to it, and it gradually fixed upon itself the term nitre, at first applied to a different salt. When this change of nomenclature took place does not appear ; but it was completed before the time of Roger Bacon, who always applies the term nitrum to our nitrate of potash and never to carbonate of soda.

In the preceding history of the chemical facts known to the ancients, I have taken no notice of a well- known story related of Cleopatra. This magnificent and profligate queen boasted to Antony that she would herself consume a million of sistertii at a sup^ per. Antony smiled at the proposal, and doubted the possibility of her performing it. Next evening ! a magnificent entertainment was provided, at which I Antony, as usual, was present, and expressed his opi- iiion that the cost of the feast, magnificent as it was, fell far short of the sum specified by the queen. She

/

• Prorerba xxr. id.

lOS HIStOmT OP CHEMlSrET*

requested bim to deier compvtin^ tiU the dessert was finished. A Tessel tolled wnh Tinegmr was placed be- fore ber« in which she threw two pearls, the finest in the world, and which were valued at ten millions of sistertii : these pearb were dissohred bv the vinegar,* and the liquid was immediatelT drunk by the queen. Thus $he made £^>od her boast« and destroved the two finest pearls in the world.t This stonr, supposing it true, shows that Cleopatra was aware that vinegar has the prv^perty of dissolving pearls. But not that she knew the nature of these beautiful productions of nature. We now know that pearls consist essentially of carbonate of lime, and that the beauty is owing to the thin concentric lamin«B, of which they are composed. Nor have I taken any notice of lime with which the ancients were well acquainted, and which they applied to most of the uses to which the modems put it. Thus it constituted the base of the Roman mortar, which is known to have been excellent. They employed it also as a manure for the fields, as the modems do. It was known to have a corrosive nature when taken in- ternally ; but w^is much employed by the ancients ex- ternally, and in various ways as an application to ulcers. Whether they knew its solubility in water ' does not appear ; though, from the circumstance of itfr beinjf used for making mortar, this fact could hardljr' escape them. These facts, though of great importance^ could scarcely be applied to the rearing of a chemi structure, us the ancients could have no notion of action of acids upon lime, or of the numerous sal which it is capable of forming. Phenomena whicl must have remained unknown till the discovery of th* acids enabled experimenters to try their efiects upo: limestone and quicklime. Not even a conjecture a] pears in any ancient writer that I have looked i

• " Cuius asperitas visque in tabem maneiitas resoMt.'* 'f PiiniiHi8t.NaUix.35..,

4

CHEMI8TUT OF THE AKCIEKTS. 109.

about the difference between quicklime and lime- stoixe. This difference is so great that it must have been remarked by them, yet nobody seems ever to have thought of attempting to account for it. Even the method of burning or calcining lime is not de- scribed by Pliny ; though there can be no doubt that the ancients were acquainted with it.

Nor have I taken any notice of leather or the me- thod of tanning it. There are so many allusions to leather and its uses by the ancient poets and histo- rians, that the acquaintance of the ancients with it is pat out of doubt. But so far as I know, there is no

description of the process of tanning in any ancient

author whatever.

5|

/

110 HUtOftT OF CBIMIft&T«

CHAPTER III.

CHEMISTRY OF THE ARABIANS,

■ r

Hitherto I have spoken of Alchymy, or of the ^^; mical manufactures of the ancients. The people tCK whom scientific chemistry owes its origin are the^ Arabians. Not that they prosecuted scientific che^; mistry themselves ; but they were the first persons whd* attempted to form chemical medicines. This they did^ by mixing various bodies with each other, and applying"' heat to the mixture in various ways. This led to the discovery of some of the mineral acids. These they^ applied to the metals, &c., and ascertained the efFeetjT produced upon that most important class of bodielk|[ Thus the Arabians began those researches which h gradually to the formation of scientific chemistry. Wi must therefore endeavour to ascertain the chemi< facts for which we are indebted to the Arabians.

When Mahomet first delivered his dogmas to countrymen they were not altogether barbarous. P< sessed of a copious and expressive language, and habiting a burning climate, their imaginations w< lively and their passions violent. Poetey and fid were cultivated by them with ardour, and with coi derable success. But science and inductive phi sophy, had made little or no progress among the The fatalism introduced by Mahomet, and the bl: enthusiasm which he inculcated; rendered them

CHBimTRT or THE AltABlAVS. Ill

rious bigots and determined enemies to every kind of intellectual improvement. The rapidity with which tkey overran Asia, Africa, and even a portion of &rope, is universally known. At that period the western world, was sunk into extreme barbarism, and *ke Greeks, with whom the remains of civilization still 'ingered, were sadly degenerated from those sages Ho OTaced the classic ao^es. Bent to the earth under the most grinding but turbulent despotism that ever disgraced mankind, and having their understandings ^aled up by the most subtle and absurd, and un- comprising superstition, all the energy of mind, all the powers of invention, all the industry and talent, Hich distinguished their ancestors, had completely forsaken them. Their writers aimed at nothing new or great, and were satisfied with repeating the scientific fticts determined by their ancestors. The lamp of science fluttered in its socket, and was on the eve of ^ing extinguished.

Nothing good or great could be expected from such * state of society. It was, therefore, wisely deter- JJ^ined by Providence that the Mussulman conquerors, stoiild overrun the earth, sweep out those miserable governors, and free the wretched inhabitants from the trammels of despotism and superstition. As a des- potism not less severe, and a superstition still more gloomy and uncompromising, was substituted in their place, it may seem at first sight, that the conquests of the Mahometans brought things into a worse state than they found them. But the listless inactivity, the ^niost deathlike torpor which had frozen the minds of Mankind, were effectually roused. The Mussulmans displayed a degree of energy and activity which have few parallels in the history of the world : and after the conquests of the Mahometans were completed, and the Califs quietly seated upon the greatest and most powerful throne that the world had ever seen ; after Almanzor, about the middle of the eighth cenlurj^^RaA.

112 HISTOEY OP CHEMISTRY.

founded the city of Bagdad, and settled a permanent and flourishing peace, the arts and sciences, "which usually accompany such a state of society, began to make their appearance.

That calif founded an academy at Bagdad, which acquired much celebrity, and gradually raised itself above all the other academies in his dominions. A medical college was established there with powers to examine all those persons who intended to devote themselves to the medical profession. So many pro* fes^rs and pupils flocked to this celebrated college, from all parts of the world, that at one time their num- ber amounted to no fewer than six thousand. Public hospitals and laboratories were established to facilitate a knowledge of diseases, and to make the students, acquainted with the method of preparing medicines. It was this last establishment which originated with th^^ califs that gave a first beginning to the science o^ chemistry, ■ f

In the thirteenth century the caJif Mostanser established the academy and the medical college 2^ Bagdad : for both had fallen into decay, and h been replaced by an infinite number of Jewish semi-r"? naries. Mostanser gave large salaries to the profes^-^ sors, collected a magnificent library, and established ^ new school of pharmacy. He was himself often prg^'f sent at the public lectures.

The successor of Mostanser was the calif Haroun-: Al-Raschid, the perpetual hero of the Arabian tale^« He not only carried his • love for the sciences furthei^ than his predecessors, but displayed a liberality and * tolerance for religious opinions, which was not quits consistent with Mahometan bigotry and superstition*, j He drew round him the Syrian Christians, who trans- \ lated the Greek classics, rewarded them liberally, and j appointed them instructors of his Mahometan sub- jects, especially in medicine and pharmacy. He pro-: tected the Christian school of DschQndisabour, foundtti

CUVM.9ft%Y OF *rH£ AEABUlrS. 113

by the Kestonan Cfaristians^ before the time of Maho- met, and still continuing in a flourishing state : always surrounded by literary men, he frequently conde- scended to take a part in their discussions, and not unfrequently, as might have been expected from his xanky came off victorious.

The most enlightened of all the califs was Alma- men, who has rendered his name immortal by his exertions in favour of the sciences. It was during his reign that the Arabian schools came to be thoroughly acquainted with Greek science; he procured the translation of a great number of important works. This conduct inflamed the religious zeal of the futh- ful, who devoted him to destruction, and to the divme wrath, for favouring philosophy, and in that ^ay diminishing the authority of the Koran. Al- mamon purchased the ancient cliBissics, from all quar- ters, and recommended the care of doing so in a par- ticular manner to his ambassadors at the court of the ^eek emperors. To Leo, the philosopher, he made "^e most advantageous offers, to induce him to come to Bagdad ; but that philosopher would not listen to ^ invitation. It was under the auspices of this en- %htened prince, that the celebrated attempt was made to determine the size of the earth by measuring a r^gree of the meridian. The result of this attempt ^^ does not belong to this work to relate.

Almotassem and Motawakkel, who succeeded Al- '^'^on, followed his example, favoured the sciences, ^ extended their protection to men of science who ^ere Christians. Motawakkel re-established the ce- lebrated academy and libi*ary of Alexandria. But "C acted with more severity than his predecessors with regard to the Christians, who may perhaps have abused the tolerance which they enjoyed.

The other vicars of the prophet, in the different Mahometan states, followed the fine example set them b; Almamgn. Already in the eig-hth century ll[i^ ^ONt^

VOL. I, I