Albertus Magnus on Alchemy: Between Ars and Scientia

The aim of this paper is to accurately assess the epistemological status of Albertus Magnus' (ca 1200-80) alchemy. In modern bibliography there is a "black or white" approach to the question of whether Albertus regarded alchemy as an art or scientia, and thus the adoption of an absolute thesis on the matter tends to create a series of interpretational problems. In contrast, I argue that Albertus' approach to alchemy does not exclude either art or scientia and, depending on the context, the Dominican master sometimes considers alchemy as an art-when it is connected with manual labor-and sometimes as a scientia-when it is connected to natural-philosophical and metaphysical aspects. At the end of my paper, I offer a way of properly assessing the Albertian alchemy, and determining how and when to accurately connect it with the notions of art and scientia.