Three presidential addresses to the Chemical Section of the Philosophical Society of Glasgow : on the study of the history of chemistry, recent inquiries into the early history of chemistry, eleven centuries of chemistry / by John Ferguson.

  • John Ferguson
Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Three presidential addresses to the Chemical Section of the Philosophical Society of Glasgow : on the study of the history of chemistry, recent inquiries into the early history of chemistry, eleven centuries of chemistry / by John Ferguson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    27/60 page 11
    from time to time; but he died in 1811, and nothing more was done. Next in order of time comes Ideler^ who, in his edition of Minor Greek Physicians and Physicists, Berlin, 1841-42, includes tracts by Stephanos, Theophrastos, Hierotheos, and Archelaos, but without indicating the MS. or MSS. he had consulted. Lastly, Hoefer, in 1842-13, gave a few passages from the Paris MSS. by Zosimos and Olympiodoros, and the Epistle of Isis, and to these he added, in 18*fi6, Greek extracts On the Alchemy of the Egyptians, On Symbols, On the Opinions of the Ancient Philosophers respecting the Principle of Things, and Hermetic Verses [by John of Damascus (?)]. These extracts, however, form a mere drop in the bucket, compared with the whole. The manuscripts and the authors are mentioned by several writers besides those already quoted. The earliest allusion to them by a Westex-n alchemist, accoi'ding to Kopp,' is in a Treatise on Gold by Pico della Mrrandola, the nephew, who died in 1553. t He merely quotes the following as chemical authors :—Hostanes, Hermes, Democritus, Psellus, (Jlympiodorus, Heliodorus, Stephanus, Synesius, Theophilus, and Zosimus—all of whom are more or less pro- minent in the manuscripts. The older Western alchemists, such as Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, Arnold of Villanova, and Baymond Lully (all of whom nourished in the thirteenth and fourteenth cen- Beitrage, p. 321. t This tract is contained in Manget's Bibliotheca Chemica Curiosa, Geneva, 1702, vol. ii., p. 563. In the list of chemical writers given in Nazari's It Metamorfori Metallico et Humanv, Brescia, 15G4, fol. 25-27, the names resem- bling those of the Greek MSS. are—Hermes, Democritus niedicus, Agadimon (? Agathodamion), Astanus (? Ostanes), Michael Psellius, Joannes Damascenus, Archelaij Turba, Theophilus, Maria. The following remarks on the subject by Gratarolus, which, so far as 1 remember, are not given by Kopp, may be added here, as shewing that these MSS. were well known in the sixteenth century. He refers to the alchemic interpretation of the story of Jason, to the burning of the books by Diocletian, and the Greek derivations of the name. Among the writers on the subject he has the following :—Blemidas, sr.-ji xe^o^oita.-., liber Gracus, manuscriptus in regia Gallic bibliotheca. Isaac monachus scripsit doyv^ov f/A6ohov ... in regia Gallia bibliotheca, manuscriptus, Grrecu. Zosimus author Grrecus asseruatur in bibliotheca llegia : scripsit de Sacra arte, de Gompositione aquarum ad xe<>noiia.», de instrumentis & caminis. Sunt & alij huius artis prseccptores, ut Ghristiauus, Heliodorus, Theophrastus, Arche- laus, Pelagius, Ostanes, Olympioilorus, Democritus, Dioscurus, Synesius, & Stephanus, cuius est liber de Magna & sacra scientia. Omnes hi Grajci sub nominibus antiipiis, mihi tamen reccntes uidentur. Vera Akhemiw Doctrina, Basileaj, 1661. Prolegomena por G. Gratarolum. His last remark is interesting.
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3