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Article ID: CBB396204226

Byzantine Engagement with Islamicate Alchemy (2022)

Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences
Volume: 113
Issue: 3
Pages: 559-580
Publication date: 2022
Language: English

URI: http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/721264

DOI: 10.1086/721264

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Communication within scientific contexts Transmission of texts Translations Natural philosophy Knowledge circulation Cross-cultural interaction; cultural influence Transmission of ideas Arab/Islamic world, civilization and culture Alchemy Medieval Byzantium

This essay analyzes the known evidence for Byzantine engagement with what are conventionally termed “alchemical” texts, theories, and practices of the Islamic world. Much of the evidence is difficult to date. Nevertheless, the aggregated direct, indirect, and circumstantial evidence suggests at least some engagement by Greek-speaking scholars throughout the Middle Ages. This engagement took various forms, from the use of Arabic, Persian, and Turkish terminology to the adaptation of whole Arabic treatises in Greek. Sometimes the Byzantine texts emphasize their Islamicate sources, and sometimes they do not mention these sources at all. The resulting picture is still fragmentary, but it indicates that medieval Greek-speaking scholars were active in the circulation of chemical knowledge and techniques in the Mediterranean and Middle East. Byzantium, therefore, should no longer be left out of research into long-term patterns in the history of science.

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