CHAPTER VI

THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS

OUR knowledge of the Divine Art, later called alchemy, as
practised in ancient Greece is chiefly derived from a collec¬
tion of chemical recipes in some Graeco -Egyptian papyri now
preserved at Leyden, and a number of manuscripts, notably one
at St Mark’s Library in Venice, written about the tenth or
eleventh century. That the Greeks in Egypt were practising
the art about a.d. 290 is evident from the edict issued by the
Emperor Diocletian commanding that diligent inquiry should
be made “for all the ancient books which treated of the art of
making gold and silver,” and that such books should be burned
and destroyed.

In Europe the Art, which apparently began with the technical
operations of metallurgy, had no special name other than the
Divine or Sacred Art until the fifth or sixth century of our era.
It appears to have originated in the efforts of the workers in
metals to imitate gold. They knew its properties and value,
and the problem arose as to how might the commoner metals
be changed into the one that was the most precious. This idea
no doubt deeply impressed these men, for a successful solution
of the problem meant not only wealth, but power. Their early
conclusions are to be found in one of the papyri at Leyden which
is supposed to have been written about a.d. 300, and is believed
to be a copy of one of the ancient Egyptian books on the pre¬
paration of gold and silver. It contains considerable informa¬
tion on metallurgical operations and records a hundred and
one recipes. It appears to have been the formulary of a gold¬
smith, as directions are given for making alloys for use in the
manufacture of vases, images, and cups, with instructions for

41

LURE & ROMANCE OF ALCHEMY

colouring them, together with methods of making gold and
silver links. There is also a formula for preparing an amalgam
of copper and tin, which was probably intended as an imitation
of gold, and a method is described of blackening metals by means
of sulphur. These early workers knew the physical characters
of the metals, and by making suitable alloys they no doubt
found methods of forming one alloy that had the appearance
of gold. A number of the recipes have for their aim the pro¬
duction of an alloy which shall be indistinguishable from the
real metal, but no idea of transmutation is apparent in the
papyrus.

In some of the recipes a “ never-ending ” material and an
“asemon” are mentioned. The latter is believed to have been
an alloy of gold and silver, probably the Egyptian electron, as
a material which could give the qualities of the precious metals
to the baser ones.

In another papyrus allusion is made to the making of imitation
precious stones and dyes. Colours played an important part
in the operations, the idea being that if a metal could be dyed
its nature would be changed and it would become like the metal
it was designed to imitate.

The two primary dyes that gave the colours of the precious
metals were xanthosis, capable of dyeing yellow, and leucosis,
capable of dyeing white. Although they were different in
appearance, it was thought that these two dyes were one and
the same substance; therefore, it was argued, there must be
some more powerful dye, if it could be discovered, that would
really change the baser metal into the one it was sought to
imitate. In this we have the germ of the idea of transmutation
which gradually developed into the conception of the Philo¬
sopher’s Stone. The greatest secrecy was observed regarding
these recipes for making the alloys, which at first were handed
down orally from generation to generation by the operators.
There were secrets in all trades, and in the early indentures the
apprentice was bound not to divulge his master’s secrets, a
42

THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS

command mentioned in one of the Leyden papyri in the words :
“He puts out terrible oaths in order that they may be revealed
to none.”

To one of the later alchemical manuscripts, written about the
tenth century, there is added a recipe for making an “excellent
Gold Hide,” “a sacred secret which ought not to be disclosed
to anyone nor given to any prophet.”

The first Greek writer who mentions the transmutation of
metals is H£neas Barasus, who lived about the fifth century
A.D., and wrote a commentary on the works of Theophrastus,
but no mention of the Philosopher’s Stone is made until we come
to the seventh century. The treatises of the Greek alchemists
that have come down to us are few and fragmentary, and are
chiefly a mixture of magical formulae, astrological ideas, to¬
gether with mystical allusions to an earlier philosophy. There
is, however, evidence to show that they were acquainted with a
number of ores, minerals, and the working of metals.

Zosimus of Panopolis, who flourished about the fifth century
of our era, is the first alchemist of whom we have any authentic
record. That he was a man of unusual skill in the Hermetic
Art may be gathered from references made to him in works of
the eighth and ninth centuries by Photius and other historians,
who allude to him with veneration. According to Suidas, he
wrote twenty-eight books on alchemy, but “most of these were
destroyed in the past.” In one of his treatises he gives an
interesting description of several pieces of apparatus which
were employed in the laboratories of his time. The alembic
used for distillation, he tells us, was made of glass with a stem
of clay or terra-cotta, and another was used for the fixation of
mercury. An alembic made with three stems or tubes, which
he calls a tribicus, was also used, and he further mentions a
still-head, a receiver, and other vessels for using with a furnace.
He states in one of his works that, besides the doctrines con¬
tained in the hermetic books, there was “the secret know¬
ledge of the priests enveloped in mystery which it was

43

LURE fif ROMANCE OF ALCHEMY

forbidden to reveal,” which shows that much of the Greek
knowledge of the art was acquired from Egypt.

Zosimus wrote works called The Great and Divine Art of the
Making of Gold and Silver , The Book of the Truth of Sophe the
Egyptian , and The First Book of the Achievements of Zosimus of
Thebes. In the last-named he observes that the kingdom of
Egypt was maintained by the art of making gold, and also

TRIBICUS AND STILL

From a Greek manuscript of the eleventh century

alludes to the ancient stelae on which, in that country, the
secrets of the art were inscribed in symbolic characters. He
mentions some of the apparatus used in the Temple of Memphis,
and refers to the pneumatic and mechanical works of Archi¬
medes. In the Ninth Book, called Imouthe , allusion is made to
I-em-hetep, the son of Ptah, an early Egyptian deity of healing,
and he also mentions the book Chema , which, according to
tradition, was given by the angels to mortals. Other treatises
attributed to him are The Book of Keys and The Keys of Magic ,
one on the tempering of bronze and iron, one on making glass,
and another dealing with lime, which, he says, is “the secret that
must not be revealed.”

Another of the writers on the art of this period was Sextus
Julius Africanus, who is said to have been an Assyrian by birth.

44

THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS

He was the author of several works on alchemy, medicine, and
the natural sciences, as well as on geography and military
subjects.

The most important figure of the fifth century in alchemy was
Synesius, who in the year 401 was made Bishop of Ptolemais.
A man of great intellect, he was in turn physician, astronomer,
agriculturist, and diplomat.

In the latter capacity he
was sent as ambassador on
a mission to the Emperor
Arcadius at Constantinople.

He wrote several philoso¬
phical treatises, and also a
work on dreams and their

STILLS

interpretation, with which he From a Greek manuscript of the eleventh

includes a number of alche- century

mical recipes. Among the works attributed to him is one ad¬
dressed to Dioscorus, priest of the great Serapis of Alexandria,
which begins: “Synesius the philosopher greets you.” In
another treatise, probably apocryphal, called The Old Book of Dr
Synesius , Greek Abbot , there is a paragraph which says: “Take
from them that living silver and you will make it the medicine
or quintessence, the imperishable and permanent power, the
bond of all elements which contained within itself the spirit which
unites all things.”

Another alchemical philosopher of whose life but little is
known was Olympiodorus, who is the reputed author of a
treatise called Olympiodorus , Philosopher to Petasius , King of
Armenia , on the Sacred and Divine Art. Whether he was the
Greek historian of this name who flourished about the year 412
is uncertain. Among his predecessors he mentions Synesius
and Mary the Jewess, while he also refers to the Oracles of
Apollo and to inscriptions on the Temple of Isis. He relates
ancient traditions as to the origin of gold, and says it was pro¬
duced in the soil of Ethiopia. He refers also to the tomb of

45

LURE fif ROMANCE OF ALCHEMY

Osiris and the alchemical symbol of the serpent biting its tail,
as well as to the Zodiacal signs, from which it may be inferred
that he had travelled in Egypt. He mentions the library of
Ptolemy at Alexandria as though he had visited it, and quotes
the opinions of the Greek philosophers of the Ionic school.
Like other early writers, he comments on the symbolism used

by the alchemists to ensure secrecy and on the
obscurity of the language they employed. “ The
ancients,” he says,

have the custom of hiding the truth and of veiling
and obscuring by allegories things which are clear
and evident to all the world. They admit three
tinctures. The first disappears rapidly [is vola¬
tilized] like sulphur and arsenic. The second dis¬
appears slowly, like sulphurous materials, and the
third will not disappear at all. These are metals,
stones, and earths.

The first tincture, which is made with arsenic,
contains white copper. Arsenic is a kind of sul¬
phur which is readily volatilized ; all that resembles
arsenic is volatilized by fire, and is called sulphurous
matter.

Olympiodorus gives particulars of a second tincture, which was
used in the making of emeralds, the formula for which was as
follows :

Take two ounces of fine crystal and half an ounce of calcined
copper. First of all prepare the crystal by the action of fire. Place
it in pure water, wipe it, crush the substances in a mortar, and fuse
them together at an even temperature.

Kopp, who made a very thorough research in connexion with
the authors of the early Greek manuscripts, lays importance on
one who passed under the name of Democritus. By some
critics he was believed to be identical with the Greek philo¬
sopher of the same name, but there is no proof of this. Demo¬
critus of Abdera travelled and studied in Egypt. He became
acquainted with the secret lore of that country, and wrote
46

APPARATUS FOR
DIGESTION

From a Greek manu¬
script of the eleventh
century at Leyden

THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS

several works about the secrets of nature. Some of his writings
appear to relate to the methods of the Egyptian alchemists, so
that it is possible that those writings represent some part of the
lore which the elder Democritus had acquired.

The study of alchemy in Greece appears to have reached its
highest point about the fifth or sixth century and during the
reign of Theodosius I and his successors. The Temple of
Serapis was the centre of Greek civilization in Alexandria, and
it is there probably that alchemy was chiefly studied. Its
destruction by command of Theodosius was a calamity to the
history of both science and art. The Serapeum of Memphis
and the Temple of Ptah, which are thought to have been the
seats of the study of alchemy in Egypt, were destroyed about the
same time as the Alexandrian schools of learning.

Mention should here be made of the part the Jews played in
the fusion of the Oriental doctrines of religion and science with
those of Greece in the early years of the Christian era. For a
time the Alexandrine Jews took the lead in the arts and in
philosophy, and there is evidence of the connexion of the Jews
with alchemy both in the Leyden papyri and in the early Greek
manuscripts. In the papyrus of Reuben there is an alchemical
recipe attributed to Hosea, King of Israel, and in others refer¬
ences are made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, while other
Jewish names are found in the alchemical writings of the third
century. There is also a papyrus dealing with magic and
astrology entitled The Holy Book , or the Eighth Monad Book
of Moses , the Key of Moses , and the Secret Book of Moses.
The Jews probably acquired a knowledge of the Divine Art
from the Egyptians, for Zosimus tells us that “the Sacred Art
of the Egyptians, and their control of gold which resulted from
it, was only revealed to the Jews by a fraud, and they made it
known throughout the rest of the world.”

Mary the Jewess, a mysterious figure, whose name appears in
some of the early manuscripts, is said to have written several
treatises on alchemy in one of which is said: “Touch not the

47

LURE & ROMANCE OF ALCHEMY

Philosopher’s Stone with thine hands ; thou art not of our race,
thou art not of the race of Abraham.” Her name is perpetu¬
ated in the Balneum Marine (Bath of Mary), which, according to
tradition, she originated.

The Gnostics, that strange sect among the early Christians
who claimed to have a superior knowledge of spiritual matters
and interpreted the sacred writings by a mystical philosophy,
are also said to have been skilled in alchemy. Gnostic names
are mentioned by the early Greek writers on alchemy, and,
according to Reuben, the recipes in the Leyden papyri are
founded on Gnostic ideas, and are attributed to Marcus, the
Gnostic prophet, who is said to have been born in Palestine.
The serpent with its tail in its mouth is often found engraved on
stones with magical symbols of the Gnostic period, and this, as
well as the concentric circles, was used as an emblem of the
Philosopher’s Egg, the sign of the Universe, and of Alchemy.
The serpent was considered both good and evil, as instanced in
the Egyptian Apop or Apophis, the snake-giant, and as sym¬
bolic of the powers of darkness and their war against the Sun.

The Stoics also, in their endeavour to prove that the whole
Cosmos was permeated by the divine, became supporters and
defenders of magical, alchemical, and astrological ideas, and
there seems little doubt that they had a considerable influence
on the development of the art in Greece.

48