Sal ammoniac
Sal ammoniacum; the eagle of the alchemists
- Known today as
- Ammonium chloride, from volcanic vents and later made from soot and urine.
- Kind
- Mineral, in 1 older authority
- Constituents
- ammonium chloride
- Earliest authority here
- The alchemists
- In other databases
- Wikidata search
Sal ammoniac: what was it used for?
For the eyes and in plasters; its spirit, in smelling salts, to revive the faint.
Sal ammoniac: what does modern science say?
Still used in cough mixtures, in soldering, and in salty Nordic liquorice.
Pharmacognosy & Toxicology
- Constituents
- Mechanism
- An expectorant that irritates the stomach and reflexly thins bronchial secretion, and a urinary acidifier; the “spirit” of it, ammonia, in smelling salts revives by irritating the nose and triggering a gasp. It was long made from the soot of camel dung at the oracle of Ammon in Libya, which named it.
- Toxic dose
- Safe at the gram doses of cough mixtures; large doses give acidosis.
- Standing
- In the pharmacopoeias as an expectorant and acidifier; a food additive (E510) in Nordic salty liquorice.
- Martindale: The Complete Drug Reference, 40th ed. (2020), “Ammonium chloride.” Standard reference work
Constituent names open the compound’s record at PubChem, and “ChEMBL” beside a name opens its record at ChEMBL, the European Bioinformatics Institute’s database of bioactive molecules. Where a mechanism line was checked against ChEMBL (ChEMBL 37, read 1 October 2026), the check is shown with the measured value and its source paper, or says plainly that nothing has been measured. Doses are as the references give them, for description only; this is not medical advice. Each source carries the result of its check against Crossref, PubMed, or the authority’s page: see Verification.
Sal ammoniac: what lore surrounds it?
Its Latin name came, after a confusion, from the “salt of Ammon” said by Pliny to be dug near the temple of Ammon in the Libyan desert. Because it rises in the vessel when heated, the alchemists called it the eagle.
Sal ammoniac: what did the older authorities say?
- The alchemists
- Prized it as one of the spirits of the art, which carried metals up with it in sublimation. See Alchemy.
Sources
- Pliny the Elder, Natural History. Read in part · the text read
- Pomet, P. (1694). Histoire générale des drogues (English, A Compleat History of Druggs, 1712). Read in part · the text read
Verification
- Checked
- October 1, 2026
- Passes
- Every sentence read against its sources, in the pass over the remaining 343 entries
- The Standing line checked against the authority it names (EMA, WHO, FDA, CITES, Commission E)
- Every dated or regulatory claim checked by category across the database
- Sources
- 3 cited: 2 read in part, 1 standard reference work.
- Corrections
- None were needed.
What was checked, how, and what was found is set out on the Verification page. A checked source is one whose record was found; it does not make the entry medical advice.
Cite This Entry
Version 1 · first published September 30, 2026
- Chicago
“Sal ammoniac.” In Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1. The Thinking Press, 2026–. Last modified September 30, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/sal-ammoniac.
- MLA
“Sal ammoniac.” Materia Medica, edited by B. C. P. Statema, version 1, The Thinking Press, 30 Sept. 2026, thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/sal-ammoniac. Accessed 8 Oct. 2026.
- APA
Sal ammoniac. (2026, September 30). In B. C. P. Statema (Ed.), Materia medica (Version 1). The Thinking Press. Retrieved October 8, 2026, from https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/sal-ammoniac
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See Also
Drawing on the same sources: Pomet
Nearby in the alphabet
Salt · Sage (Salvia officinalis) · Saffron milk cap (An orange mushroom of pine woods that weeps carrot-colored milk) · Sandalwood (The heartwood of Santalum album) · Saffron (The stigmas of Crocus sativus) · Rue (garden rue)
Historical description, not medical advice.