Customer Reviews

The Pirotechnia of Vannoccio Biringuccio: The Classic Sixteenth-Century Treatise on Metals and Metallurgy

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This is not an easy book to read. It predates Agriccola's De Re Metallica by several years, and has not yet made the bridge of thought from alchemy into chemistry. As a result, the section on fireworks speaks of principles of air and such to explain how they work.

Additionally, many of the usages are different than we think of them today. For example, in the production of Aqua Fortis (nitric acid), one of the steps involves the use of red alum. After 10 years of research, I finally figured out that this referred to alunite, a mineral alum found in a certain mine in Italy which contained a high level of iron.

Given the difficulty in interpreting what is being said, it is still an invaluable book to researchers in the field. It contains valuable information about the thought and processes in use in Italian metallurgy in the 16th century.