Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- Acknowledgments
- List of abbreviations
- Illustrations
- Introduction
- Part I Ancient texts
- 1 HERMES TRISMEGISTUS: The Emerald Table (Tabula Smaragdina)
- 2 PLATO (c. 427-347 BC): From the Timaeus
- 3 ARISTOTLE (384-322 BC): From the Meteorology
- 4 PSEUDO-DEMOCRITUS (first or second century AD): From The Treatise of Democritus On Things Natural and Mystical
- 5 ANONYMOUS (first or second century AD): Dialogue of Cleopatra and the Philosophers
- 6 ANONYMOUS (late third century AD): From Leyden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus
- 7 ZOSIMOS OF PANOPOLIS (fl. c. 300 AD): Of Virtue, Lessons 1–3
- 8 STEPHANOS OF ALEXANDRIA (first half of seventh century AD): From The Great and Sacred Art of the Making of Gold
- 9 ANONYMOUS (eighth or ninth century AD): The Poem of the Philosopher Theophrastos Upon the Sacred Art
- Part II Islamic and medieval texts
- Part III Renaissance and seventeenth-century texts
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - ANONYMOUS (late third century AD): From Leyden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- Acknowledgments
- List of abbreviations
- Illustrations
- Introduction
- Part I Ancient texts
- 1 HERMES TRISMEGISTUS: The Emerald Table (Tabula Smaragdina)
- 2 PLATO (c. 427-347 BC): From the Timaeus
- 3 ARISTOTLE (384-322 BC): From the Meteorology
- 4 PSEUDO-DEMOCRITUS (first or second century AD): From The Treatise of Democritus On Things Natural and Mystical
- 5 ANONYMOUS (first or second century AD): Dialogue of Cleopatra and the Philosophers
- 6 ANONYMOUS (late third century AD): From Leyden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus
- 7 ZOSIMOS OF PANOPOLIS (fl. c. 300 AD): Of Virtue, Lessons 1–3
- 8 STEPHANOS OF ALEXANDRIA (first half of seventh century AD): From The Great and Sacred Art of the Making of Gold
- 9 ANONYMOUS (eighth or ninth century AD): The Poem of the Philosopher Theophrastos Upon the Sacred Art
- Part II Islamic and medieval texts
- Part III Renaissance and seventeenth-century texts
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The following selections represent the practical or “exoteric” side of alchemical writing with its exclusive concern for the physical and technical processes required to produce an object or substance or to improve that which is “natural” by means of artifice. Thus the recipes illustrate the close connections between early chemistry and metallurgy, dyeing, jewelry making, writing techniques, and various other crafts. The style is clear, simple, and methodical, vastly different from the highly imagistic allegories of the Dialogue of Cleopatra and the Philosophers and the Visions of Zosimos of Panopolis. If one ignores the persistent uncertainties about substances, measures, and durations of processes, it might be said that here are reasonable examples of technical writing – overlooking, of course, the rather common emphasis on fraud and deception.
Leyden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus, which bear the names of the cities in which they are deposited, are written in Greek – probably by the same writer – and date from the end of the third century AD. They are, in the words of Earle R. Caley, the translator, “by far the earliest original historical evidence that we have in our possession concerning the nature and the extent of ancient chemical knowledge” (1149). Leyden Papyrus X includes 111 recipes, often written in an “abbreviated, incomplete form such as workers, more or less familiar with the nature of the process, would use” (1150).
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Alchemy ReaderFrom Hermes Trismegistus to Isaac Newton, pp. 46 - 49Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2003