Note 133 — Chapter IV · THE ALCHEMICAL STUDIES OF SCOT

Manuel Comnenus reigned as Emperor of the East from 1143 to 1180, while Frederick I. was Emperor of the West from 1152 to 1190. This would seem to indicate the twelfth century as the time when these works of the Pseudo Archelaus were produced. It is curious to notice that Manuel was the Emperor who suffered defeat by sea at the hands of George of Antioch the Sicilian admiral (Gibbon, chap. lvi.) This brave seaman was the same who founded the library of the Martorana in Palermo (see above, p. 25), and enriched it with the literary spoils of his conquests. It is highly probable that it was in this way the scholars of Sicily became acquainted with the Byzantine alchemy.