The Arabs, after their conquest of Egypt in the seventh century, carried on the researches of the Alexandrian school, and through their instrumentality the art was carried to Morocco and in the eighth century to Spain, where it flourished. There is little doubt that Egyptian tradition, filtering through Alexandrian Hellenic sources, was the foundation upon which the infant science was built, and this is borne out by the circumstance that the art was attributed to Hermes Trismegistus and supposed to be contained in its entirety in his works. It was probably in the Byzantium of the fourth century, however, that alchemical science received embryonic form. It is probable such a belief existed throughout Europe in connection with the bronze-working castes of its several races. Thus there grew up in Egypt the belief that magical powers existed in fluxes and alloys. This black powder was mystically identified with the underworld god Osiris, and consequently was credited with magical properties. The resulting oxide was supposed to possess marvelous powers, and it was thought that there resided within it the individualities of the various metals -that in it their various substances were incorporated. History of Alchemyįrom an early period the Egyptians possessed the reputation of being skillful workers in metals, and, according to Greek writers, they were conversant with their transmutation, employing quicksilver in the process of separating gold and silver from the native matrix. To this name the Arabs affixed the article al, resulting in al-khemeia, or alchemy. Wallis Budge, in his Egyptian Magic, however, states that it is possible that alchemy may be derived from the Egyptian word khemeia, "the preparation of the black ore," or "powder," which was regarded as the active principle in the transmutation of metals. The Aryan root is ghu, (to pour), whence comes the modern word gush. One highly possible origin is the Arabic al (the) and kimya (chemistry), which in turn derived from late Greek chemeia (chemistry), from chumeia (a mingling), or cheein (to pour out or mix). There is also considerable divergence of opinion as to the etymology of the word. There is considerable disagreement as to which, the scientific or the philosophical, is the dominant aspect and the manner in which the two were integrated (which to some extent varied tremendously from alchemist to alchemist). Alchemy is also the name of the Gnostic philosophy that undergirded the alchemical activity, a practical philosophy of spiritual purification. The art and science by which the chemical philosophers of medieval times attempted to transmute the baser metals into gold and silver.
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