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Chemistry (word)


In the history of science, the etymology of the word chemistry is debatable. It is agreed that the word derives from the word alchemy, which is a European one, derived from the Kimiya (کیمیا) Alchemy al-kīmiyāʾ (الكيمياء). The Arabic term is derived from the Ancient Greek χημία khēmia or χημεία khēmeia. However, the ultimate origin of the root word, chem, is uncertain.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the majority theory is that al-kīmiyāʾ is derived from χημία, which is derived from the ancient Egyptian name of Egypt (khem, khame, or khmi, meaning "black earth", contrasting with the surrounding desert.) Therefore, alchemy is the "Egyptian art". However, it is also possible that al-kīmiyāʾ derived from χημεία, meaning "cast together".

There are two main views on the derivation of the word, which agree in holding that it has an Arabic descent, the prefix al being the Arabic article. But according to one, the second part of the word comes from the Greek χημεία, pouring, infusion, used in connexion with the study of the juices of plants, and thence extended to chemical manipulations in general; this derivation accounts for the old-fashioned spellings "chymist" and "chymistry". The other view traces it to khem or khame, hieroglyph khmi, which denotes black earth as opposed to barren sand, and occurs in Plutarch as χημεία; on this derivation alchemy is explained as meaning the "Egyptian art". The first occurrence of the word is said to be in a treatise of Julius Firmicus, an astrological writer of the 4th century, but the prefix al there must be the addition of a later copyist. In English, Piers Plowman (1362) contains the phrase "experimentis of alconomye", with variants "alkenemye" and " alknamye". The prefix al began to be dropped about the middle of the 16th century (further details of which are given below).


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