Book Three, chapter 3

1Chapter 3

2And the planets have inks particular to their works: Saturn, its ink is burnt wool; Jupiter, its ink is made from verdigris; Mars, its ink is made from cinnabar; the Sun, its ink is made from yellow orpiment; Venus, its ink is made from saffron; Mercury, its ink is mixed, made from lac, orpiment and verdigris; the Moon, its ink is made from white.

3Aristotle set down, in his book called the Book of Lamps and Banners, for Alexander, the images of the planets, when he imparted to him in it subtle points of this science. He set down in it that the image of Saturn is the image of a black man wrapped in a green cloak, bald-headed, in his hand a sickle.

4And Jupiter: the image of a man clothed in garments, sitting on a chair. And Mars: the image of a man riding a lion, in his hand a long lance. And the Sun: the image of a beardless man, fair of face, on his head a crown and in his hand a spear, and at his side an image whose head is the head of a man, and its hands likewise, raised of hands and forearms, and its body as though it were the body of a horse with four legs.

5And Venus: the image of a girl, in her right hand a comb and in the other an apple, and her hair is let down. And Mercury: the image of a naked man riding an eagle, and he is writing. And the Moon: the image of a horseman riding a hare.

6And among what he deposited in that book, after his apportioning of the substances and the stones among the planets: O Alexander, whenever you make something for some planet, make the body from which you make the work suited to that planet. As for the garments: when you go out to something under some ascendant, put on the garments that resemble that ascendant, and make the lord of that ascendant fortunate as far as you are able, and make the seventh unfortunate, because the ascendant is for the seeker and the seventh for the one sought.

7The colours of Saturn are black, all of it, and if it is wool it is better. The colours of Jupiter are green, and if it is silk it is better. The colours of Mars are fiery red, and if it is figured or embroidered silk it is better. The colours of the Sun are surpassing golden yellow, and if it is gold or yellow silk it is better.

8The colours of Venus are faint rosy red and what resembles it, and if it is silk it is better. The colours of Mercury are the mixed colour that accompanies all the colours, and if it is interwoven it is better. The colours of the Moon are shining white, and if it is linen or white silk it is better.

9As for their fumigations: to Saturn belongs every thing of fetid smell, such as ammoniacum, castoreum, asafoetida and what resembles them; to Jupiter the fragrant, balanced perfume, such as ambergris and aloeswood; to Mars every hot, pungent perfume, such as pepper, long pepper and ginger; to the Sun the fragrant perfume, such as musk and ambergris; to Venus every balanced perfume, such as rose, violet and green myrtle; to Mercury every compound perfume, such as narcissus, violet, myrtle and mallow; to the Moon every cold perfume, such as camphor, rose and ṭarāthīth.

10Since we have mentioned this, let us join what we have mentioned with the inks needed in the operations of the faces of the signs, in accordance with their images mentioned in the Second Treatise:

11The first of that is Aries. Its first face: its ink is reddish-fair, and its description is that green gall is ground fine, then likewise the gum and the vitriol, each on its own; the gall is one part and the gum and the vitriol half a part. Then it is combined with the white of an egg, made into pellets, put into a vessel and secured; and whenever it is needed, it is pounded and dissolved.

13And the third face: its ink is white, made from talc and white.

14«Taurus»: the first face of it: its ink is dusty, smoky, oleander-coloured. Its making is that the smoke is taken, gathered at the top of an aludel, and there is put with it gum and glue, the thickness of a dirham for the ūqiyya, and a little bāruq [word uncertain], and one draws with it.

15And the second face: its ink is golden yellow, and its description is that gall is taken and crushed, and what is in its inside of blackness is removed, and it is steeped in as much water as covers it; then this water is beaten with red water extracted from lac, and put with them a little gum, and draw with it. And the third face: its ink is yellow, and it has gone before.

16«Gemini»: the first face of it: its ink is golden, and its description has been mentioned. And the second face: its ink is red,

18And the third face: its ink is yellow, and we have mentioned it. «Cancer»: the first face of it is white, and it has gone before. And the second face is golden yellow, and it has gone before. And the third face is black, like the ink of the first face, except that its vitriol is in equal [measure] with the gall.

19«Leo»: the first face of it is dusty, oleander-coloured. And the second face is golden yellow. And the third face is pomegranate red,

21«Virgo»: the first face of it is golden red, and that is that saffron is ground until it is at the utmost fineness; then it is beaten with the water of steeped green gall, and leave it for an hour, and put in it a little gum, and draw with it. And the second face is dusty, oleander-coloured. And the third face is yellow inclining to redness,

23«Libra»: the first face of it is dusty, and the second black, and the third white. «Scorpio»: the first face of it is black, and the second yellow, and the third dusty. «Sagittarius»: the first face of it is red, and the second yellow,

25And the third face is dusty. «Capricorn»: the first face of it is green,

27And the second face is red,

29And the third face is black. «Aquarius»: the first face of it is musk red, made from shaybān, which is the blood of the two brothers, and a little gum. And the second face is black, and its making is that good Persian ink, gum and gall are taken, of each one part, and burnt papers, half a part; and all that is pounded and sifted and kneaded with the white of eggs, and pellets are made and dried, and at need it is dissolved and one draws with it. And the third face is green, made from the gall of an animal and a little gum, and one writes with it.

30«Pisces»: the first face of it is grey,

32The second face is dust-coloured; it is made from tamarisk, burnt thorn, and a little gum, and draw with it. The third face: its ink is red. These inks are needed of necessity in the operations of magic and of talismans, and likewise all that we have mentioned before of the division of existing things among the planets.

33For that reason Mercury the knower said: taking on the nature of the planet is a help, to whoever persists in it, toward drawing down its powers. He meant only the use of what is of the portion of its spiritual power (rūḥāniyya) and of what it has poured its powers upon, of food, drink, clothing, fumigation, time, craft, ink, invocation, sacrifice, stones, engraving or talisman, marvel-working (nīranj), celestial relation, and the drawing down of spiritual power: that these all together, or whatever of them is needed, be of the portion of the planet the spreading of whose powers is sought in what one attempts, so that the celestial powers may be joined to the earthly powers through the connection between them, and they become one and the matter is completed. If it is otherwise, or one neglects some of them, there is contrariety and the matter sought is nullified.

34Likewise the need is also pressing for knowledge of the climes and the lands, for the planets have actions peculiar to them in one clime and not another, and in one town and not another. For that reason it is found that they have poured out in some lands things that are not found in other lands, of minerals, plants and stones, and of actions also. That is like Kutubbat [Tibet], whoever enters which does not cease laughing and joyful, without any cause for wonder, until he leaves it; and Barghar, in which no child is born that lives until it reaches puberty, unless it moves away from it.

35The Western Sea is distinguished by silk (khazz), fur, storax, mastic and Slavic servants. The Yemen is distinguished by frankincense, [word uncertain: al-ḥiṭr] and wars. In the Yemen there is a mountain from whose summit water springs and flows down its two sides, and before it reaches the ground it congeals, and from it comes this white Yemeni alum.

36Indian aloeswood is found on an island in India, five days from Qamār, called Qabriya. At Qamār is the Qamārī aloeswood; between it and al-Ṣanf are three days, and at al-Ṣanf is the Ṣanfī aloeswood also, which is better than the Qamārī because it sinks in water through its excellence and its weight. Aloeswood is found only in these three places. Mecca and Medina: neither plague nor leprosy befalls them. People say: the fever of Khaybar, the spleen of al-Baḥrayn, the boils of al-Buḥayra, and the plagues of Syria.

37Onyx (al-jaz') is a stone brought from two places, from the Yemen and from China, and the best of it is the Yemeni. It is enough [to say] of it that its name is derived from grief (al-jaza'). The people of China dislike to approach its mines because of the ill omen taken from it; only a people who are lepers, who have no livelihood other than extracting it, take it out of its mines in their land.

38The kings of Ḥimyar of the Yemen did not think it right to wear anything of it, nor did they admit it into their treasuries, nor did they think it right to hang anything of it about the neck or to wear it as a ring. Whoever hangs anything of it about his neck or wears it as a ring, his cares become many, he sees in his sleep evil, frightening dreams, and quarrelling between him and people becomes frequent. If a stone of it is hung on a child, the flow of its saliva becomes great. It is used only in the engravings of talismans, because the spiritual powers (rūḥāniyyāt) of the planets make its actions many.

39Tutty is found in India on the shores of the Indian Sea, and it is thin, white, dull in colour. There is also a Chinese kind of it from the Sea of China, and it is a green stone, rough, perforated. There is also some of it in al-Andalus, and it is a white stone, speckled, lead-like, heavy, which dyes red copper yellow.

40Lapis lazuli is found among us in al-Andalus at Almería and Lorca; the barādī stone among us in the region of Lisbon; and the red ruby stone in a plain of the districts of Málaga known as the plain of Shant Mayūr and the magnet in the place of the districts of Tudmīr; and shādana is very abundant in the mountains of Cordoba, and likewise the stone peculiar to al-Ḥaṣw [reading uncertain], called the Jewish [stone]; and the golden marcasite, which has no equal, at the mountain of Unda; and gems in the region of Barcelona; and gold is gathered in the valley of Granada; and mercury of high worth at a mountain known as the mountain of al-Barānis; and tutty at Elvira in a village called Baṭarna, and it is the noblest tutty for colouring copper, as we have mentioned; and the mines of kohl at Cordoba also; and vitriol at Labla; and other such wonders with which places have been singled out.

41And the chief town of al-Ahwāz changes the nature of whoever of the kings and nobles settles in it to the nature of its people, and no one with a red cheek has been found in it, and fever is constant there; and al-Ahwāz: its mountain that overlooks it is singled out by the abundance of vipers, and its houses by scorpions and the deadly jarrārāt. And a valley in the farthest part of Khurāsān, whose bottom the sight does not reach and into which one cannot make one's way, and it adjoins the lands of India; and it is the valley singled out by the diamond.

42And the land of Hīt is singled out by naphtha, which the Rūm call oil of stone, and it is also singled out by naphtha salt, which is a black, hard salt. And the Andarānī salt, which is ṭabarzad salt, its colour white, intensely white, with which a village in Syria called Andarā has been singled out. And sādhurwān does not occur in the East, but occurs only in Ifrīqiya, at Tripoli in it; it is a mould that occurs in the holes of the wood of the terebinth, into which rain water descends and congeals, and it is black, light, astringent in taste;

43and likewise in the holes of the wood of the shīz. And jawz jundum, which is an earth like chickpeas, white tending to yellow, brought from Barqa and from Unda also, and it is also in the region of Tlemcen; honey nabīdh is made strong by it and it hastens it, so that they put it into it in the morning and drink it in the evening; and so on to numerous things that cannot be counted. Are not these celestial talismans, whose causes are spiritual?

44And Galen has mentioned that if you examine, you will find most of the forms of men and their constitutions follow the nature of the land in which they are. And Hippocrates has mentioned [it] in many places of his book On Airs and Lands; among it is his saying that the forms of men and their characters, most of that is found according to the nature of the lands in which they grew up.

45For that reason the need was pressing for knowledge of the climes and the lands, because of the planets' being particular to some of them rather than others, just as the planets in themselves have been singled out by sublime actions. So the Moon makes plants grow and puts them in good order, and it is the cause of the ripening and maturing of fruits, and the cause of the forming of the yolk in eggs, and of the flow and ebb; and it conveys the powers to the world. And it may spoil some fruits, such as the fig, for the Moon spoils it and the Sun puts it in good order;

46and the Moon makes green plants grow, and puts the animals of the sea in good order, and spoils the animals of the land by night, and that is when they are uncovered to it. And its eclipse is its being in the seventh from the greater luminary, with the interposition of the earth or the Tail. And Jupiter produces life and gives it [pronoun ambiguous: life or the world] wisdom, and lays down the governances of the classes from the side of religion, and establishes the laws. And Venus produces amusements and luxury, and pours desires upon her possessor, and gives him neither governance nor government.

47And Mercury gives speech and cunning, and produces subtlety of reflection. And Saturn establishes gains, and produces tillage, and gives depth of insight, and lays down government and fortification by lofty buildings. And Mars produces bloodshed, subjugation and adversaries. And the Sun gives light to all the planets, and puts in good order the world and everything on the face of the earth, and subdues darkness, and helps toward things beneficial; and in it the sight spreads and the soul is gladdened; and it is the most balanced of the planets in course and the greatest of them in action, and it is placed [so as to] move the inner, eccentric sphere, which revolves about its own centre from west to east each day fifty-six minutes and eight seconds in mean motion. And it is the one that aids in drying foods, ripening fruits and making herbage grow; and in sum it is the lamp of the world. How wondrous are these effects, and how elegant these marvels! Glory be to the Originator, the Restorer.