Sciences of Roger Bacon’s Opus Maius

Meagan S. Allen is a historian of science, specializing in the medical alchemy of the later Middle Ages. Her research interests lie at the intersection of alchemy, pharmacology, and theology, especially in the writings of the thirteenth-century polymath Roger Bacon. She is the author of Roger Bacon and the Incorruptible Human: Alchemy, Pharmacology, and the Desire to Prolong Life (2023), which examines Bacon’s desire to use alchemy to create a medicine that would extend human life by centuries. Allen is currently Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of the History of Science and Technology at Johns Hopkins University, USA.

• The Opus maius: A Plea for Reform 1. Roger Bacon’s Scientia Experimentalis: A Review of Bacon’s diverse Treatises 2. The Division of the Sciences in Opus maius IV, 1, 2: Roger Bacon’s Sources and Their Transformation 3. The Science of Weights: Jordan of Nemore’s Influence on Roger Bacon’s Scientific Method 4. Roger Bacon and John Pecham on the Nature and Role of Arithmetic 5. On Vision: Roger Bacon’s Opus maius (V.1–2) from the perspective of Alhazen’s Optics (I–II) 6. Roger Bacon on Mathematics, Perspectiva and Astrology: The ‘Unnamed Master’ Revisited 7. Knowability and Power of Ars: Roger Bacon’s Utopian Science as Anti-Magic 8. Alchemy and Pharmacology in the Opus maius 9. Roger Bacon and Secrecy: Alchemical Techniques of Deception and the Doctor Mirabilis