The Art of Glass

It was first published, in Italian, in 1612, as L'Arte Vetraria by Antonio Neri. Neri was a priest and alchemist. He traveled extensively back and forth between Italy and Holland. While on these journeys, he stopped and studied glass manufacturing whenever possible. Neri gained a great deal of information concerning the manufacture of glass and its treatments for various purposes. Neri wrote this information into his book which is laden with details for the known methods of making and coloring glass and for using glass to simulate precious stones such as rubies, sapphires, and, of course, the sorcerers’ stone.


A second edition printed in 1661 made the work more widely known. An English translation by Christopher Merrett MD, one of the early Fellows of the Royal Society, was published in 1662. Merrett added very extensive notes of his own which almost doubled the length of the book. That text became the master for subsequent editions. It was eventually translated into Latin, French, German, and Spanish, and reprinted at least twenty times over the course of almost two centuries.