Distillation Alchemical Apparatus System

Timeline

1. 780–1000Baghdad and Córdoba of the Abbasid Caliphate · Islamic worldArabic chemist Jabir ibn Hayyan (c. 750–815) systematically organized the Greco-Alexandrian distillation tradition, designing and refining the alembic for purifying minerals and preparing medicinal essences. Ibn Sina (Avicenna) further applied distillation to extracting essential oils from aromatic plants; medieval Islamic chemistry laid the theoretical and practical foundations of distillation technology.
2. 1150–1400Salerno, Italy and Toledo, Spain · Southern EuropeIn the 12th century, Arabic alchemical-chemical texts were translated into Latin through the Toledo Translation School in Spain. The medical school of Salerno in Italy applied distillation to preparing herbal tinctures, and European monasteries began distilling wine to produce early brandy (aqua vitae, "water of life"); distillation gradually spread through European medical and alchemical practice.
3. 1520–1600Switzerland and the Holy Roman Empire · Central EuropePhilippus von Hohenheim (Paracelsus, 1493–1541) introduced distillation into medical chemistry (iatrochemistry), advocating the use of mineral distillates (compounds of antimony, mercury, and arsenic) in place of traditional herbal remedies. His school promoted distillation furnaces and retort experiments across European courts, shifting distillation from an alchemical secret art toward a systematic experimental method.
4. 1601–1610European courts and academic institutions · EuropeBetween 1601 and 1610, the influence of the Paracelsian iatrochemistry school spread throughout European court laboratories, with distillation furnaces and alembic apparatus becoming standard experimental tools of court physicians, alchemists, and natural philosophers. The Prague court of the Bohemian emperor Rudolf II gathered a large number of alchemist-chemists who carried out large-scale experimental distillation. At the same time, the commercial distillation of Dutch genever and French Cognac brandy expanded, laying the foundation of the European spirits industry. Oswald Croll and others published iatrochemistry works systematically expounding experimental distillation methods.
5. 1660–1800England and France · Western EuropeRobert Boyle (1627–1691) used distillation experiments to study the properties of gases, driving the transformation of alchemy into modern chemistry. Lavoisier (1743–1794) established the law of conservation of mass through precise distillation experiments, completing the chemical revolution. The distillation apparatus system was wholly transformed from a tool of alchemical secret arts into the core methodological instrument of modern scientific experimentation.