An Arabic dictionary of technical alchemical terms: MS Sprenger 1908 of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin (fols. 3r-6r).
The Arabic MS Sprenger 1908 (Staatsbibliothek, Berlin) is a handbook of medieval alchemy. Among the works it preserves, we can find the only extant witness to the Arabic original of the well-known Liber de aluminibus et salibus. In this paper, I focus on a detailed alchemical dictionary preserved in this manuscript (fols. 3r-6r) whose explicit aim is to clarify the meaning of the secret language used by the alchemists to conceal the names of substances and operations. Other versions of the same alchemical lexicon are found in Syriac and karsuni in MSS Oriental 1593 and Egerton 709, both preserved in the British Library. After describing these manuscripts, I analyse the contents of this dictionary, its structure, its different versions, and the features of the alchemical language that it attests to, providing some examples to show how this kind of dictionary is still a useful tool for the contemporary researcher.
Ferrario
Gabriele
G
University of Pennsylvania, USA. gabriele.ferrario@gmail.com
D000422:Alchemy; D001083:Arabia; D002621:Chemistry / Q000266:history; D004015:Dictionaries, Chemical as Topic; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049691:History, Medieval; D007802:Language; D008373:Manuscripts as Topic / Q000266:history*