page_title: Alembic
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Alembic / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Drawings of alembics from a Renaissance chemistry book by Andreas Libavius. These were glass and ceramic hoods for vessels used for distillation. The distillation vessel (called the "cucurbit") would be heated by a flame, the liquid inside would boil and the vapor would rise into the alembic, where it would condense by contact with the cool glass walls and run down the spout into a receiving container. Alembics were invented during the Middle Ages for use in alchemy, the protoscientific precursor to chemistry.
context_page_description: An alembic is an alchemical still consisting of two vessels connected by a tube, used for distilling.
context_section_description: Dioscorides's ambix (described in his De materia medica) is a helmet-shaped lid for gathering condensed mercury. For Athenaeus (≈225 C.E.) it is a bottle or flask. For later chemists it denotes various parts of crude distillation devices.
  Alembic drawings appear in works of Cleopatra the Alchemist, Synesius, and Zosimos of Panopolis. There were alembics with two (dibikos) and three (tribikos) receivers. According to Zosimos of Panopolis, the alembic was invented by Mary the Jewess.
  The anbik is described by Ibn al-Awwam in his Kitab al-Filaha (Book of Agriculture), where he explains how rose-water is distilled. Amongst others, it is mentioned in the Mafatih al-Ulum (Key of Sciences) of Khwarizmi and the Kitab al-Asrar (Book of Secrets) of al-Razi. Some illustrations occur in the Latin translations of works which are attributed to Geber.
caption: Alembics from a 1606 alchemy book
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