Chemical Education Today
From Past Issues
Ancient Recipes by Kathryn R. Williams
While paging through Volume 4, I happened upon an engaging title, “The Stockholm Papyrus, An English Translation with Brief Notes” (1). I learned from reading Earle Radcliffe Caley’s introductory remarks that “The Stockholm Papyrus” is the second of a pair of papyri. Caley had published a translation of “The Leyden Papyrus X” the previous year (2). Originally written in Greek in the third century C.E., the two sources “are by far the earliest original historical evidence…concerning the nature and the extent of ancient chemical knowledge.” The documents were obtained by Johann d’Anastasy, Swedish vice-consul to Alexandria in the early 19th century, as part of an assemblage of Greek papyri in Thebes. As a result of purchase by the government of the Netherlands, the Leyden Museum of Antiquities housed most of the collection, but at least one document remained in Stockholm. Hence, the references to those cities in the titles. The two papyri contain a total of over 200 procedures—recipes in the view of Caley—for ancient chemical arts. The Leyden document emphasizes treatments of metals. Typical examples are Purification of Tin, Manufacture of Asem (asem or asemon is a general term for alloys intended to imitate gold or silver), and Falsification of Gold, with a few procedures for dyeing cloth. The Stockholm papyrus provides more extensive information about dyeing, as well as the preparation of imitation precious stones. According to Caley, “the two papyri are complementary and taken together they give an excellent cross-sectional view of the operations and aims of chemical technology in the beginning centuries of the Christian Era.” In his commentaries on the papyri, Caley notes that “the recipes are often in an abbreviated, incomplete form such as workers, more or less familiar with the nature of the process, would use.” He draws special attention to the final recipe in the Stockholm document: Sun, Berbeloch, Chthotho, Miach, Sandum, Echnin, Zaguel, accept me who comes before thee. Trust thyself (to the God), annoint thyself and thou shalt see him with thine eyes.
which, as the translation reveals, “contains a magical or theurgical formula [which]…tends to show that the chemical arts in ancient Egypt were largely in the hands of the priestly caste.”
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The two papyri were translated during his graduate student days at Ohio State University and presaged Caley’s later contributions to the Journal. A search of the Journal ’s online index with “Caley” in the author field yields 10 contributions other than the Leyden and Stockholm translations, all but three on early chemical arts or archaeological chemistry. In his Introductory Remarks to the ACS Symposium on Archaeological Chemistry in 1950, Caley broadly defines the subject as “studies on the composition of ancient materials…, investigations on the decay or corrosion of ancient materials…, methods for the restoration of ancient objects,” as well as “studies of the materials and techniques of the fine arts…, detection of forgeries or alterations of objects of art [and]…the development of special methods…for the scientific investigation of ancient materials and objects” (3). The latter aspect formed a major part of Caley’s professional investigations, which were recorded in more than 130 journal articles and eight books. Caley’s photograph appeared on the cover of the March 1967 issue of the Journal along with a pointer to his article “The Early History of Chemistry in the Service of Archaeology” that appeared in the same issue. The first page of this article, his final Journal contribution, has another photograph of Caley, here holding the plaque for the 1966 Dexter Award of the ACS Division of History of Chemistry (4). Caley remained active in archaeological endeavors after retirement, coauthoring an analysis of ancient Roman coins, published just months before his death in February 1984 (5). Some favorite recipes from the Leyden and Stockholm papyri are reproduced on the next page. Literature Cited 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Caley, E. R. J. Chem. Educ. 1927, 4, 979. Caley, E. R. J. Chem. Educ. 1926, 3, 1149. Caley, E. R. J. Chem. Educ. 1951, 28, 63. Caley, E. R. J. Chem. Educ. 1967, 44, 120. Carter, G. F.; Caley, E. R.; Carlson, J. H. Archaeometry 1983, 25, 201.
If something from a JCE from decades past strikes your fancy, write it up for the From Past Issues page. Send your ideas or submissions to Kathryn R. Williams, Department of Chemistry, University of Florida, P. O. Box 117200, Gainesville, FL 326117200; email:
[email protected].
Journal of Chemical Education • Vol. 77 No. 3 March 2000 • JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu
Chemical Education Today
From Past Issues
Selected Ancient Recipes From The Stockholm Papyrus
From The Leyden Papyrus X
19. Production of Ruby
34. A Procedure for Writing in Letters of Gold
The treating of crystal so that it appears like ruby. Take smoky crystal and make the ordinary stone from it. Take and heat it gradually in the dark; and indeed until it appears to you to have the heat within it. Heat it once more in gold-founder’s waste. Take and dip the stone in cedar oil mixed with natural sulphur and leave it in the dye, for the purpose of absorption, until morning.
94. Mordanting for Silician Purple Put in the kettle 8 chus of water, a half a mina of alum, 1 mina of flowers of copper (and) 1 mina of gall-nuts. When it boils put in 1 mina of washed wool. When it has boiled two or three times take the wool out. For when you leave it therein a longer time then the purple becomes red. Take the wool out, however, rinse it out and you will have it mordanted.
[In ancient times, and among the alchemists, the term “flowers of copper” referred to copper oxide.]
To write in letters of gold, take some mercury, pour it in a suitable vessel, and add to it some gold in leaves; when the gold appears dissolved in the mercury, agitate sharply; add a little gum, 1 grain for example, and, (after) letting stand, write in the letters of gold.
42. Coating of Copper If you desire that the copper shall have the appearance of silver; after having purified the copper with care, place it in mercury and white lead; mercury alone suffices for coating it.
89. Another (Preparation) The invention of sulfur water. A handful of lime and another of sulfur in fine powder; place them in a vessel containing strong vinegar or the urine of a small child. Heat it from below, until the supernatant liquid appears like blood. Decant this latter properly in order to separate it from the deposit, and use.
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 77 No. 3 March 2000 • Journal of Chemical Education
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