The Masā’il Khālid li-Maryānus al-rāhib (Kāhlid’s Questions to the Monk Maryānus) is an alchemical dialogue that features Khālid b. Yazīd b. Mu‘āwiya (d. 704), son of the second Umayyad caliph, and Maryānus, a Byzantine alchemist monk. It is presented as a series of questions and answers about the great work and the famous philosopher’s stone. This text holds a prominent place in the history of alchemy. It was written in Arabic, perhaps in the first half of the tenth century. It is also the first alchemical treatise to have been fully translated into Latin, in 1144 by Robert of Chester, under the title Morienus. This translation was widely diffused in the West, with several editions and translations into vernacular languages from the 16th century onwards. The Arabic version had never been edited. As for the Latin texts, they had known editions, but they were old and non-critical. Moreover, they did not take into account the Arabic original. My thesis offers the reader a critical edition and a French translation of the Arabic text and the two main Latin versions. I also present a study and a commentary of the text. On the Arabic side, it deals with its context of production, its sources and the doctrine it contains. On the Latin side, our study focuses on the place of the Morienus in the movement of medieval Arabic-Latin translations, and on the specificities of the translation in relation to its original. I have also studied in detail the textual traditions of the three edited versions.
Dapsens, M. (2021). «Arabice appellatur Elixir» : les Masā’il Khālid li-Maryānus al-rāhib dans leurs versions arabe et latine. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/26344