Since the 1980s, whisky labels must legally state the % Alcohol-by-Volume, the decimal measure of ethanol content. Previously, it was Degrees Proof in the UK (based on Specific Gravity or density, Sikes since 1816) and in US Proof (200-point content volume, Tralles hydrometer from 1842). Alcohol and whisky were lawfully linked, but alcohol’s true meaning remained obscured.
Alcohol’s customary meaning is derived from the Arabic word for mineral eyeliner, al-kohl. However, the etymology is not Arabic, but German, rendering the conventional meaning misleading. In Arabic, al-kohl was pulverised antimony made from the mineral stibnite; mascaras also used black lamp and crushed ores as eye protection and cosmetics since pharaonic times in Egypt. There is a similar word from Arabic folklore that describes a maleficent jinni, the body-eating demon called al-kuhul or al-ghawl: ghoul in English. Ghawl is mentioned in the Quran (37: 47) as the dangerous and heady effects found by consuming fermented drinks. Countermanding the evil jinni, folktales also created a more benevolent jinni, the genie, famed for being a captive in the lamp.
The earliest Latin translations of Arabic manuscripts described alcohol as pulverised minerals by Juddaeus Tortuoscensuis in Liber Servitoris Medicinaa and Regnaldus Novigentus’ Mesue Opera Medicinalia of 1479, both spelt as alcohol. In 1488, Saladino Asculo’s, Compendium Aromateriorum, used a variation, alchochol. Followed by Giovanni da Vigo’s Practica in Arte Chirurgica Copiosa in 1488, who described his powdered precipitate of mercury as alcofol. Alchohol and alcofoll first appeared in English as a ‘most fyne poudre’ in Bartholomew Traheron’s 1543 translation of Vigo.
The seed of confusion and obfuscation was planted in Germany by the polymath Swiss physician-chemist Paracelsus (Theophrastus von Hohenheim). He coined the term Liquor Alchahest in 1526 to describe his alchemical search for the mythic universal solvent. Paracelsus appropriated the High German word allgeist, meaning ‘pure, all spirit,’ or al gar heis — the alchemist term meaning the residuum as ‘very hot.’ In England, the common term for distilled spirits at this time was hotte waters. Most of Paracelsus’s treatises were posthumously transcribed and published by students and physicians; all continued to refer to the Liquor Alkahest as either mineral powders or alcohol vini/alcool vini (spirit of wine), rectified brandtweiner (brandy), or as aqua vitae (water of life), aqua forte and aqua ardente (strong or burning waters), used in recipes for making elixirs. The word ‘elixir’ is also derived from Arabic al-iksir, describing the transmuting powers of mineral powders.
Paracelsus’ alkahest was based on his search for chemical essences in medicine, and under his spagyric method, he further formulated the Tria Prima principle that extracted from inanimate bodies their spirits: the soul being combustible (e.g., sulphur), the spirit being volatile (mercury, fermented liquids), and the body (salts) being neither combustible nor volatile. To obtain their spiritual essences, different apparatuses were required. Alkahest minerals were dissolved, distilled or sublimated using aludels and retorts, while fermented alkahest was distilled in alembics: one rendered powder, the other condensed liquid.
Mistranslations or misattributions by alchemists and distillers continued the dual meaning into the 19th century as pulverised powder and distilled spirits. In 1892, the portmanteau word ethanol was devised: ethane + alcohol. Today, alcohol and ethanol are the world’s lingua franca for the intoxicating volatile compound.
It makes etymological sense that pulverised minerals used as topical eyeliner is not the correct attribution for the intoxicating substance. While the other Arabic meaning is poetic, if not ironic: that every water of life bottle (Latin aqua vitae = Gaelic uisge = Anglo whisky) warns of a ghoul or ghost, jinni, or genie within. Paracelsus was alcohol’s real harbinger, verifying that every bottle of whisky holds at least 40% ‘pure spirit’ of ethanol.
