الإثمد

The Arabic al-ithmid (الإثمد) referred to the mineral stibnite (antimony sulfide, Sb₂S₃), a dark silvery ore prized across the ancient world as a cosmetic and medicine. Ground to a fine powder, al-ithmid became kohl — the black eye pigment applied across the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia to protect eyes from sunlight, prevent infection, and adorn the face. Arab physicians in the Islamic Golden Age documented its medicinal properties: al-Kindi described it as a treatment for eye disorders, and Ibn Sina (Avicenna) included it in his Canon of Medicine as an astringent with multiple applications.

The Latin word for the element — antimonium — appears in medieval European texts and is one of etymology's genuine puzzles. The most plausible derivation traces it from Arabic al-ithmid via a scribal or phonetic distortion: the medieval Latin stibium (from Greek stimmi) competed with antimonium in alchemical texts, and the word's true source remains disputed among historians of science. One theory proposes antimonium derives from a Greek phrase meaning 'not a monk's metal' — supposedly because several monks died testing the metal's toxicity — but this is likely folk etymology. Arabic ithmid, filtering through Latin scribal hands, is the more convincing ancestor.

European alchemists became fascinated by antimony in the medieval and early modern periods. The physician and alchemist Paracelsus promoted antimony compounds as powerful medicines in the 16th century, spurring a controversy about whether antimony was healing or poisonous — it is both, depending on dose and form. The 1604 alchemical text Triumphal Chariot of Antimony (attributed to Basil Valentine, possibly a pseudonym) described antimony's purifying properties so compellingly that antimony-based medicines became fashionable in European courts, despite repeated deaths from overdose.

Today antimony is element 51 on the periodic table, symbol Sb (from Latin stibium). Its compounds are used as flame retardants in plastics and textiles, as semiconductors, in lead-acid battery plates, and in the production of polyethylene terephthalate for plastic bottles. The element's ancient cosmetic and medicinal use is now primarily of historical interest — modern kohl in most countries has replaced stibnite with safer substitutes. The Arabic eye-medicine word has become the name of a global industrial commodity.