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Quite simply there was no such thing as Western alchemical doctrine in the first century AD.
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Anything like that happening in the first century is prety rediculous (I have to confess I went and look up your quote to make sure Day said first century [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] ).
I have read bits and pieces of the book (so much to read, so little time! [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img] ) and have liked it overall, especially the retellings of norse myths, but the conclutions are based on such shakey facts and congectures, I take most of it with a grain of salt. It is always hard to read anothers mind, and Tolkien's is so complex it would be imposible to reasonably deduce more than a handfull of his sources. An example of something I find hard to swallow is on p.150 were he compares the power of Narya and the One Ring to the fires of good and evil alchemy. First of all, the two rings are not even comparable in any way (powers, potency, etc.). Secondly, I think he is trying to hard to tie everything into alchemy. Well thats my view on it.