ON ALCHEMY

and one is allowed to imagine it according to the judgment of
one's own mind. As far as I am concerned, whether it is true
or not, I care little. However, it is certain from history
and the annals of historical events that the Emperor
Diocletian Roman Emperor (r. 284–305 AD); he famously ordered the burning of alchemical texts in Egypt in 296 AD to suppress the wealth—and thus the rebellious power—of the province. diligently sought out and burned all the
books of this art, on account of the uprisings among the
Egyptians, so that wealth might not accrue to them from such
an art original Greek: διὰ τὰ νεωτερισθέντα Αἰγυπτίοις, πρὸς τὸ μὴ πλοῦτον ἐκείνοις ἐκ τῆς τοιαύτης προσγίνεσθαι τέχνης.. This craft they call Alchemy Alchymia: a distorted word,
or Archymia, as if you were to say the "chemistry of silver"
original Greek: ἀργύρου χημείαν (argyrou chemeian); others call it chemia, or chymia; others
chrysopoeia original Greek: χρυσοποιΐα (chrysopoiia), meaning "the art of making gold.". Those, indeed, who have written something
concerning this art are these:

Arnold of Villanova. A major 13th-century physician and scholar credited with many alchemical works.

Avicenna to Asse the Philosopher. Avicenna is the Latinized name for Ibn Sina (c. 980–1037), the Persian polymath.

Blemmydes, On the Making of Gold, a Greek

book, manuscript in the Royal

Library of France. Nikephoros Blemmydes (1197–1272) was a Byzantine scholar; his alchemical works were often cited in Renaissance bibliographies.

Geber the Arab, whose commentator