A heating vessel or furnace used in laboratories or industrial processes, especially one for intense heat applications.
From Latin causus (burned or scorched), related to caustica. The term emerged in medieval scientific and alchemical texts to describe specialized heating equipment used in chemical operations.
Medieval alchemists needed specialized equipment and created specific names for every heating device—'causon' was their term for ultra-hot furnaces used in metal work and chemical transmutation, and the word survived in technical treatises long after the equipment became obsolete.
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