THE ALCHEMICAL STUDIES OF SCOT 93 



again recommended as an almost universal solvent 

 and detergent. Evidently both works proceeded 

 from one and the same alchemical school. The 

 number of Arabian chemists^ cited in the De 

 Alchimia seems to show that if these books came 

 from a Greek source it was not that of ancient times, 

 but some Byzantine school that had borrowed much 

 from Eastern alchemists. 



To give a substantial idea of the De Alchimia 

 let us translate one of the formulae which it 

 contains : ' Medibibaz the Saracen of Africa used 

 to change lead into gold [in the following manner]. 

 Take lead and melt it thrice with caustic ('com- 

 burenti '), red arsenic, sublimate of vitriol, sugar of 

 alum, and with that red tuchia of India which is 

 found on the shore of the Red Sea, and let the 

 whole be again and again quenched in the juice 

 of the Portulaca marina, the wild cucumber, a 

 solution of sal ammoniac, and the urine of a young 

 badger. Let all these ingredients then, when well 

 mixed, be set on the fire, with the addition of some 

 common salt, and well boiled until they be reduced 

 to one-third of their original bulk, when you must 

 proceed to distil them with care. Then take the 

 marchasite of gold, prepared talc, roots of coral, 

 some carcha-root, which is an herb very like the 

 Portulaca marina : alum of cumae somethinp" red 

 and saltish, Koman alum and vitriol, and let the 

 latter be made red ; sugar of alum, Cyprus earth, 

 some of the red Barbary earth, for that gives a good 

 colour ; Cumaean earth of the red sort, African 



^ Such as 'Yader saracenus,' 'Arbaranus,' 'Theodosius saracenus,' 

 'Medibibaz,' and ' Magister Jacobus Judaeus.' The name of the place 

 ' halaph ' which is probably Aleppo, and of the herb ' carcha ' point in 

 the same direction. 



