History of Hindu Chemistry

The first volume of Ray’s celebrated work, The History of Hindu Chemistry, was published in 1902. The second volume was published in 1908. It was Marcellin Pierre Eugene Berthelot (1827-1907), who inspired Ray to undertake this monumental work. In the preface to the first edition Ray wrote: “ … I was brought into communication with M. Berthelot – a circumstance which has proved to be a turning point in my career as a student of the history of chemistry. The illustrious French savant, the Doyen of the chemical world, who has done more than any other persons to clear up the sources and trace the progress of chemical science in the West, expressed a strong desire to know all about the contribution of the Hindus. In response to his sacred call I submitted to him, in 1898, a short monograph on Indian alchemy. On perusing the contents of these works I was filled with the ambition of supplementing them with one on Hindu chemistry.” Ray’s Hindu Chemistry was immediately recognized as a unique contribution in annals of history of science. Berthelot himself wrote a 15-page review in Journal des Savant in its issue of January 1903. Renowned international journals like Nature and Knowledge wrote very highly of the book. In 1912 the Vice Chancellor of Durham University, while conferring the Honorary DSc degree on Prafulla Chandra Ray, noted: His fame chiefly rests on his monumental History of Hindu Chemistry, a work of which both the scientific and linguistic attainments are equally remarkable, and of which, if on any book, we may pronounce that it is definitive.