SAL AMMONIAC, a volatile salt, of which there are two kinds, ancient and modern. The ancient sort, described by Pliny and Dioscorides, was a native salt, generated in those large inns or caravanseras where the crowd of pilgrims, coming from the temple of Jupiter Ammon, used to lodge; who, in those parts, traveling upon camels, and those creatures when in Cyrene, a province of Egypt, where that celebrated temple stood,
Ammonian food, urining in the stables, or (say some) in the parched sands, out of this urine, which is remarkably strong, arose a kind of salt, denominated sometimes (from the temple) Ammoniac, and sometimes (from the country) Cyreniac. Since the cessation of these pilgrimages, no more of this salt is produced there; and, from this deficiency, some suspect there never was any such thing: But this suspicion is removed, by the large quantities of a salt, nearly of the same nature, thrown out by mount Etna. The characters of the ancient sal ammoniac are, that it cools water, turns aqua fortis into aqua regia, and consequently dissolves gold.
The modern sal ammoniac is entirely fictitious: for which, see CHEMISTRY-Index.