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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books A History of Muslim Philosophy Volume 2, Book 5 Chapter 65: Chemistry Alexandrian Alchemy.-With the advent of Islam, the Arab tribes, many of them still nomadic, were united into one nation. Their conflicts with the neighbouring peoples which used to end as skirmishes bringing immediate defeat on the scattered tribes, now changed into regular wars often crowning them with success.

What that meant can be realized from the fact that within a hundred years of the Prophet's death, which occurred in 11/632, Islam had spread from Spain in the West to Sind in the East. As an advancing nation the Arabs came in contact with different races, and when Egypt was conquered, during the regime of the Caliph 'Umar, in 21/641, they came to know the Hellenized Egyptian culture as it then existed. Its centre was Alexandria, founded by Alexander in 332B.C.

Very soon it became an emporium of international trade attracting merchants from all over the world. Above all, the Greeks had migrated there in numbers, giving rise to a mixed culture of Egyptian and Greek origin. The Egyptians used idols in their temples and chapels, preferring those of bronze, particularly when they were gilded. The artisans of Alexandria excelled in this craft, and the manufacture of gilded bronze statues apparently became a lucrative industry.

From gilding bronze some of the artisans began to dream of making gold itself and devoted their main attention to achieve this end. Thus arose alchemy, not found before either in Egypt or in Greece. It was existing when the Arabs acquired Egypt and was one of the elements of Alexandrian culture which diffused into Arabian civilization. There are several treatises and even books which suggest that Greek science, which flourished between 300 B. C. and 200 A.

D., subse­quently passed on to the Arabs who functioned as its intermediate preservers delivering it to Europeans during the Middle Ages. Such is the accepted origin of alchemy. It now becomes necessary to offer a brief sketch of alchemy as it was founded at Alexandria. The oldest existing manuscript on alchemy is not prior to about 391/1000. But it is supposed to be a copy of a work originally written in about 100 A. D.

During this early period alchemy was a semi-secret science pursued by a few obscure persons. As Taylor[^1] says, “although the earlier alche­mists wrote in Greek, they were not Greeks, but in all probability Egyptians or Jews.