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The Identity of “Alumen” in Pliny's Natural History

Abstract

“ALUMEN” is mentioned frequently in the Historia Naturalis of the elder Pliny, and there has been some controversy about its identity. It is probable that the term was used loosely to describe a number of astringent salts, and it is clear from the tests prescribed in Pliny, H.N. 35, 184–5 (the blackening of pomegranate juice and nut-galls), that the word was sometimes used to describe a compound of iron, perhaps the sulphate, derived from iron pyrites by oxidation. Ajasson, however, boldly identifies the “alumen” mentioned in H.N. 33, 88, as sulphate of aluminium, but gives no reasons for so doing.

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BAILEY, K. The Identity of “Alumen” in Pliny's Natural History. Nature 115, 764 (1925). https://doi.org/10.1038/115764a0

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