84 THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT 



which has been reprinted by Zetzner, embodies 

 another work, the Liber diiodecim aquarum which 

 is expressly said to be taken from the ' Liber 

 Emaniiehs.' Pursuing the matter further still, we 

 come to the Liber Aristotelis which commences, 

 ' Cum de sublimiori atque precipuo.' The author of 

 this treatise, we find, claims not only the Liber 

 duodecim aquarum ('quae qualiter se habeant in 

 libro quem xii. aquarum vocabulo descripsimus, 

 prudens lector intelligere poterit'), but also, it 

 would seem, the very one of which we are in search 

 (' in libro secretorum a nobis dictum est '). Every- 

 thing^ inclines us to the belief that we here touch 

 the source from which the main part of the Liber 

 Luminis was drawn, and this conclusion is not a 

 little strengthened when we observe that the 

 treatise ' Cum de sublimiori ' is called the Lumen 

 Luminum in the Riccardian copy.^ 



The Secreta, however, was not the only source 

 from which the Liher Luminis and the Liber Dedali 

 were drawn, and the assertion of the preface that 

 the former was composed of extracts from many 

 different philosophers is fully borne out when we 

 examine the substance of the books themselves. A 

 strain of Greek influence is to be traced, for example, 

 in the names of Archelaus, Dedalus, Plato, and 

 Hermes, as well as in the use of ciatus as an equi- 

 valent for the w^ord ' cup,' and this reminds us 

 strongly of the Summida with its reference to the 

 Emperor Manuel. It is not impossible that Scot 

 may have borrowed much from the Byzantine 

 chemists of the twelfth century. With this notion 

 agrees the passage of the Liber Dedali where 



1 MS. Rice. L. iii. 13. 119. pp. 19vo.-29ro. 



