{
  "author": "ChronologiaOS editorial guides",
  "date": "2026-10-09",
  "department": "Technology & Instruments",
  "department_id": "TECHNOLOGY",
  "epistemic_label": "Source guide",
  "epistemic_status": "SOURCE_GUIDE",
  "period": "late 3rd century CE",
  "place": "Roman Egypt",
  "public_sources": [
    {
      "publisher": "Cambridge University Press",
      "title": "Anonymous (late third century AD): From Leyden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus",
      "type": "Critical edition and translation",
      "url": "https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/alchemy-reader/anonymous-late-third-century-ad-from-leyden-papyrus-x-and-the-stockholm-papyrus/B9648991C8B475894FB7F48982B151F4"
    },
    {
      "publisher": "Cambridge University Press / BJHS Themes",
      "title": "Ancient handbooks and Graeco-Egyptian collections of alchemical recipes",
      "type": "Peer-reviewed article",
      "url": "https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bjhs-themes/article/ancient-handbooks-and-graecoegyptian-collections-of-alchemical-recipes/3F2A7926F9D784A43E5170E0BA50AFB5"
    }
  ],
  "publication_state": "PUBLIC",
  "read_time": "3 min read",
  "sections": [
    {
      "body": "The Cambridge Alchemy Reader presents selections from the Leiden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus as Greek technical recipe collections from the end of the third century CE, and describes their content: procedures for metals, alloys, dyes, and artificial precious stones.",
      "heading": "Start with the anthology",
      "source": 0
    },
    {
      "body": "A peer-reviewed study in BJHS Themes compares ancient handbooks and Graeco-Egyptian collections of alchemical recipes, including both papyri and the works of Zosimos. It warns against oversimplifying the textual relationships between them.",
      "heading": "Comparing collections",
      "source": 1
    },
    {
      "body": "The research record treats the anthology dates as scholarly models and notes that the museum catalogue and object records for the papyri are still to be attached. A likely close scribal relationship between the two papyri is a separate claim awaiting manuscript analysis.",
      "heading": "What is still pending"
    },
    {
      "body": "Technical recipe content and later interpretive claims are kept apart in the record. When a recipe says how to make something look like gold, is that fraud, craft, or theory? What in the text would decide?",
      "heading": "A question to carry forward"
    }
  ],
  "short_title": "Is a recipe book alchemy or craft?",
  "slug": "leiden-and-stockholm-papyri-recipes-for-metals-and-dyes",
  "summary": "Two Greek papyri from late Roman Egypt collect technical recipes for working metals, dyeing, and imitating gems. Learn how scholars read them and why their relationship is treated with caution.",
  "tags": [
    "Alchemy",
    "Leiden Papyrus X",
    "Stockholm Papyrus",
    "Recipes",
    "Craft"
  ],
  "title": "Leiden Papyrus X and the Stockholm Papyrus: recipes for metals, dyes, and stones."
}