Editing Nitric acid (section)

=== Medieval alchemy ===
The discovery of [[mineral acids]] such as nitric acid is generally believed to go back to 13th-century European [[alchemy]].<ref>Examples: 
*{{cite book |last=Multhauf |first=Robert P. |title=The Origins of Chemistry |publisher=Oldbourne |year=1966 |location=London |author-link=Robert P. Multhauf |pages=140–141 |quote=But among them we find the rudiments of processes which were finally to lead to the discovery of the mineral acids, sulphuric, hydrochloric and nitric. The mineral acids manifest themselves clearly only about three centuries after [[Abu Bakr al-Razi|al-Razi]], in the works of Europeans [...]}}
*{{Cite book |last1=Needham |first1=Joseph |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xrNDwP0pS8sC&pg=PA195 |title=Science and Civilisation in China |volume=5: Chemistry and Chemical Technology |at=Part IV: Spagyrical Discovery and Invention: Apparatus, Theories and Gifts, p. 195 |last2=Ping-Yü |first2=Ho |last3=Gwei-Djen |first3=Lu |last4=Sivin |first4=Nathan |date=1980 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-08573-1 |location=Cambridge |author1-link=Joseph Needham |quote=It is generally accepted that mineral acids were quite unknown both to the ancients in the West and to the Arabic alchemists.}}
*{{Cite book |last=Al-Hassan |first=Ahmad Y. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h2g1qte4iegC&pg=PA59 |title=Science and Technology in Islam: Technology and applied sciences |date=2001 |publisher=UNESCO |isbn=978-92-3-103831-0 |author-link=Ahmad Y. al-Hassan |page=59 |quote=The text is given here in full because of the prevailing notion that Islamic chemists did not produce mineral acids.}}
*{{Cite journal |last1=Karpenko |first1=Vladimír |last2=Norris |first2=John A. |year=2002 |title=Vitriol in the History of Chemistry |url=http://www.chemicke-listy.cz/ojs3/index.php/chemicke-listy/article/view/2266 |journal=Chemické listy |volume=96 |issue=12 |pages=997–1005 |quote=[...] dating the discovery of nitric acid is likewise uncertain. It is estimated that this discovery took place after 1300 [...] A passage from the second part of Pseudo-Geber's ''[[Summa perfectionis]]'' [...] was long considered to be the earliest known recipe for sulfuric acid [...]}}
*{{cite book |last=Newman |first=William R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hy5sxK7pHGIC&pg=PA98 |title=Atoms and Alchemy: Chymistry and the Experimental Origins of the Scientific Revolution |publisher=University of Chicago Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0226576961 |location=Chicago |author-link=William R. Newman |page=98 |quote=[...] between the time when the ''Summa perfectionis'' was written and the seventeenth century, the mineral acids–sulfuric, hydrochloric, nitric, and the mixture of the latter two, called ''aqua regia'', had been discovered.}}</ref> The conventional view is that nitric acid was first described in [[pseudo-Geber]]'s ''De inventione veritatis'' ("On the Discovery of Truth", after {{circa|1300}}).<ref>{{harvnb|Karpenko|Norris|2002|p=1002}}. As Karpenko & Norris note, the uncertain dating of the pseudo-Geber corpus (which was probably written by more than one author) renders the date of its description of nitric acid equally uncertain. According to {{harvnb|Al-Hassan|2001|p=62}}, recipes for the preparation of nitric acid also occur in the {{lang|la|Liber Luminis luminum}}, a Latin treatise usually attributed to [[Michael Scot]] (died before 1236) but perhaps translated by him from the Arabic. One of the manuscripts of the {{lang|la|Liber Luminis luminum}} mentions that it was translated by Michael Scot; see {{cite journal |last1=Moureau |first1=Sébastien |date=2020 |title=Min al-kīmiyāʾ ad alchimiam. The Transmission of Alchemy from the Arab-Muslim World to the Latin West in the Middle Ages |url=http://hdl.handle.net/2078.1/211340 |journal=Micrologus |volume=28 |issue=22 |pages=87–141 |hdl=2078.1/211340}} Al-Hassan 2001 mentions [[Abu Bakr al-Razi]] as the work's author, but this is likely a conflation with several other Latin treatises called {{lang|la|Liber Luminis luminum}} that were sometimes attributed to al-Razi; see Moureau 2020, p. 107 (no. 5), p. 114 (no. 20), pp. 114–115 (no. 21).</ref>

However, according to [[Eric John Holmyard]] and [[Ahmad Y. al-Hassan]], the nitric acid also occurs in various earlier [[Islamicate alchemy|Arabic works]] such as the {{transliteration|ar|Ṣundūq al-ḥikma}} ("Chest of Wisdom") attributed to [[Jabir ibn Hayyan]] (8th century) or the {{transliteration|ar|Taʿwīdh al-Ḥākim}} attributed to the Fatimid caliph [[al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah]] (985–1021).<ref>For the claims regarding the {{transliteration|ar|Ṣundūq al-ḥikma}}, see {{harvnb|Al-Hassan|2001|p=62}}; {{Cite book |last1=Holmyard |first1=John Eric |url=https://archive.org/details/makersofchemistr029725mbp/page/n79/mode/2up |title=Makers of Chemistry |date=1931 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |author1-link=Eric John Holmyard |page=60}} For the claim regarding the {{transliteration|ar|Taʿwīdh al-Ḥākim}}, see {{harvnb|Al-Hassan|2001|p=62}}.</ref>

The recipe in the {{transliteration|ar|Ṣundūq al-ḥikma}} attributed to Jabir has been translated as follows:<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=440FAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Take+five+parts+of+pure+flowers+of+nitre%22 |title=Discovery: A Monthly Popular Journal of Knowledge |volume=5 |date=1924 |page=215 |editor-first=Hugh |editor-last=Pollard |publisher=John Murray |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Ḥasan |first1=Aḥmad Yūsuf |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=it2E29EkCkUC&q=%22Take+five+parts+of+pure+flowers+of+nitre%22 |title=Islamic Technology: An Illustrated History |last2=Hill |first2=Donald Routledge |date=1986 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-92-3-102294-4 |page=147 |language=en}}</ref>

{{quote|Take five parts of [[sodium nitrate|pure flowers of nitre]], three parts of [[Copper(II) sulfate|Cyprus vitriol]] and two parts of Yemen [[alum]]. Powder them well, separately, until they are like dust and then place them in a flask. Plug the latter with a palm fibre and attach a glass receiver to it. Then invert the apparatus and heat the upper portion (i.e. the flask containing the mixture) with a gentle fire. There will flow down by reason of the heat an oil like cow's butter.}}

Nitric acid is also found in post-1300 works [[Pseudepigrapha|falsely attributed]] to [[Albert the Great]] and [[Ramon Llull]] (both 13th century). These works describe the distillation of a mixture containing niter and [[Iron(II) sulfate|green vitriol]], which they call {{lang|fr|eau forte}} (aqua fortis).<ref name="Britannica19112">{{cite EB1911|wstitle=Nitric Acid|volume=19|pages=711–712}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Thomson |first=Thomas |url=http://archive.org/details/historyofchemist01unse |title=The history of chemistry |date=1830 |location=London |publisher=H. Colburn, and R. Bentley |volume=1 |page=40 |author-link=Thomas Thomson (chemist)}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Katz |first1=David A.|title=An Illustrated History of Alchemy and Early Chemistry |date=2008 |page=23 |url=http://www.chymist.com/History%20Alchemy.pdf |access-date=21 October 2023}}</ref>