Avicenna considers this as an Arabic term; but others suppose it half Arabic and half Greek, from the Arabic particle' al, and which is again derived from for to ascend.

Seneca calls it in the Latin language miliarium. Alembic and Moor's-head. It is also named capella, capitu-lum; it is a copper cap of a still tinned in the inside, made like a head, in which the pipe passing through a tub of cold water, is fixed to receive the vapour from the heated cucurbit or body, to convey it to the receiver. Before retorts were used so commonly, the matter distilled was put into a vessel called a body, with a head placed on it to receive the vapour, whence it was conveyed by a canal, called the rostrum, or beak, to the receiver; this head is properly the alembic, and is called alembicus rostratus, i. e. the beaked alembic, to distinguish it from alembicus caecus, or blind alembic, which is without a canal, as it is to receive dry substances that are sublimed, into it. The body of the alembic was placed over a fire in hot pump-water, hot salt-water, or hot sand. Alembics are preferable to stills, by requiring less fuel, and not so readily imparting empyreuma. In quickness, and the attention necessary to regulate the heat, they are less convenient.