AN ILLUSTRATED A TO Z

In these last years of the twentieth century,

there has been a revival of interest in the genre
that is Alchemy and its mkture of ancient wisdom
and novel experimentation. Neither a science
nor a philosophy,Alchemy has been the subject
of controversy and fascination for centuries'
Containing over 500 entries, this comprehensive
new illustrated dictionary is a veritable Pandora's
box of information, written with an earthy sense
of humour, but always retaining the exuberance
of the early practitioners of the art.As a practising
alchemist and linguist, Diana Fernando has been
able to return to original sources and re-interpret
their meanings. In particular, she has drawn on
many Arabic and Kabbalistic manuscripts to
provide an original viewPoint.

The strong and important visual aspect of

Alchemy is maintained by the author's skilful
artistry in over 160 illustrations created especia\
for this book, taking her inspiration from the
great symbols and emblems of every aspect of
the alchemical Phenomenon.
Like the symbol of Mercury itself,Alchemy is
ever moving and ever changing and has much
of relevance to tell us today. In this entertaining
and deeply satisfying book, the entries cover
everything from laboratory experiment to the
exploration of the soul.

Cover picture:
The EmeraldT5blet (Images Colour Library)'
The alchemical microcosm within the
macrocosm. Amidst His cherubim, God
flahveh, ilfi1!) presides over the
firmament
with the Lamb of Christ (on His righ$ and
Dove of Peace (on His left)'The glyph for
mercury in the central triangle is encompassed
by rings: one each for .alchemical sa1t, sulphur'
mercury, the sun and stars, and the zodiac'
Below the rings is the hemisphere of alchemical
winged creatures, while on the earth below is
the animate representation of the Great'Work'

d18.ee
 A BLANDFORD BOOK
.*
First published in the UK 1998 by Blandford
a Cassell imprint

Cassell p1c
Wellington House
125 Strand
London WC2R OBB

Copyright o 1998 Diana Fernando

The right of Diana Fernando to be identified as the author and illustrator

of this work has been asserted by her under the provisions of the UK
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or

transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or any information storage and ffi
t*
retrieval system, without permission in writing lrom the copyright holder
and publisher. &

I
t,,
Distributed in the United States by Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.,
387 ParkAvenue South, New York, NY 10016-8810

A Cataloguing-in-Publication Data entry lor this title is available from the

British Library.

ISBN 0-7137-2668-7

Black and rvhite. and colour illustrations bl Diana Fernando except

rvhere stated other\\'ise.

ath
Contents
Acknowledgments

Introduction 6

An Illustrated Ato Z I
Bibliography 190
To Professor R.J.W. Evans
of Brasenose College, Oxford,
whose work on RudolPh II has been a

constant source ol insPiration

Acknowledgments
would like to rhank many people lor
] On the technical side, my heartfelt thanks
rheir pan in rhis book. beginning with:
I go to Chrissie and Andrew Sheldon and
I Professor Harold lenkins. who shaped leff Chandler lor their dedication ar rheir
my thinking and love of the Renaissance computers and printers, and lor their
many years ago; Lucie Martin, who perseverance and humour in near
launched me into typographic design with impossible situations. The courteous
such generosity and encouragement; Jack services of Ganesh, my corner shop, ol
Glass, rvho more recently put me on the Broadway and Malvern Olfice Supplies,
path ol practical alchemy; and Adam Crouch End, and of Emmanuel Sturley ol
Mclean, whose Hermetic /ournals Evergreen Design, West Hampstead, are
endorsed much olwhat I had been much appreciated.
discovering.
For their artistic skills, I lvish to thank
I am indebted to all those who have especially Michael Bramman and Diana
offered me space, time and endless Tovey-Khan, not lorgetting everyone else
patience in their bookshops or libraries, rvho has devoted time and talent to the
especially Chris Johnson at Skoob Books, colour plates.
Caroline Wise at Atlantis Bookshop, the
Sheringhams ar Arrhur probsthain, the Without the resolute support ol Carolyn
stall at Watkins Books, the Sisters at Whitaker this dictionary would not have
Hengrave Ha1l, Suffolk, the librarians ar St materialized at all. Carolyn, keeper ol my
Deniol's Library, Cheshire, and R.A. sanity, has seen the book alchemize lrom
Gilbert, antiquarian bookseller ol gristol. start to finish over eight years. Her
equanimity, resourcelulness and tact have
My particular thanks are due to Dr kept me going, while her curbings on my
Kathleen Raine and the Temenos enthusiasm for words such as codswallop,
Academy, London, lor the privilege of kerlulfle and skedaddle have been
attending lectures and seminars by exemplary.
Proflessor Keith Critchlow, Dr Ramchandra
Gandhi, Warren Kenton, Dr peter Kingsley, Final1y, my long-sullering family and
Peter Malekin, John Miche11, Sir Laurens friends deserve the highest praise lor
van der Post, Dr Rupert Sheldrake and humouring me throughout, notably Fiona
Professor Arthur Versluis; all these were Sandilands, Barbara Nicholls and my rwo
arranged under the painstaking children, Sonali and Gi1es.
administration of Genevieve and Stephen
Overy. Diana Fernando, London 1997
Introduction
t had written this dicrionary 50 years closer still, it is like wine-making in that
J f,

I ago I could have been killed lor being a wine from the same vineyard, the same
I witch, for the Witchcraft Acr that grape, is subtly dilferent from bottle to
carried the death penalty was repealed bottle and year to year, for it interacts at
only ln 1951. Through the ages, alchemy - every stage in its making with the sun,
closely associated with witchcralt - has winds, rain, seasons, soil and contours of
been hounded, misunderstood or, at the the land. So it is with alchemy. We are in
very least, sniggered at. We think ol the realm ol indeflinables. What is the
Reginald Scoft's accounts of witch trials, alchemical Slone? The ones I have seen
Giordano Bruno at the stake, papal bulls are distinctly rubbery. What and who are
for the extermination of sorcerers, fews these oddities that parade across my pages
and all, as creatures of a dark past. Yet through place and time; what is prtma
alchemists have evoked such responses materia? What is the 'dew' that acts upon
well into the twentieth century. As the the Sulphur and Mercury in the making ol
outsider ol classiliable subjects, neither a the Stone, that is as real as the modern
science nor a philosophy, alchemy is sti1l alchemist Barbault shows us but that
not quite acceptable in the groves of cannot be pharmaceuticaily analysed? I
Academus. It is an esoteric way, like Tao. can give no exact answers. I follow the
Its very elusiveness as a serlous inquiry alchemists' tradition ol capitalizing letters
into the nature ollile is what attracts me. to denote o[herness ol meaning
Curiously, like the Tao of Physics or even (cabalistically loaded, loded or leaded)
the Tao ol Pooh, it is coming back into where words cannot reach. Even so, in
fashion. Though science may be occult chemistry substances have atomlc
suspicious ol this 'alchemy', paradoxically weights plus an extra quality that is not
the two are converging once more. Particle scientilically measurable. Analogously, in
physics and quantum mechanics pose the modern quantum physics, quarks exist,
selfsame ques[ions as the Presocratic but, like Schrodinger's cat, they have no
Greeks or Plato inhis Ttmaelzs: how does size.
lile tick? what is chaos, what is florm? The
world of probabiiity again replaces the The loundations of my alchemical quest
world ol certainty. were a classical education with strongly
humanist overtones (culminating in
This dictionary is not a substitute for Hamlet's 'What a piece of rvork is a manl
others; rather, it is a supplement, intended ... And yet, ro me, what is this
to put some sort of order on an orderless quintessence ol dust?') followed by long
mass of supernal size; to catalogue years of Work in esoteric schools,
without being categorical; and to edifly conversing with seers and alchemists from
with a certain lightness. Alchemy is about many lands. Add to that a satirical edge to
transforming materials, but it incorporates my nature that sees the Rabelaisian
unknowns, unpredictables. It is more dunghill at the bottom of every golden
about creative cookery than chemistry; or Renaissance stairway, and my dictionary

6
 Introduction

was begun. I am an inveterate snapper-up Such was the nature of alchemy that it
of unconsidered trifles, perhaps, llke was, like its symbol Mercury, movable and
Autolycus, littered under Mercury the
patron saint of alchemists as well as
always travelling. So were its adherents -
working amidst others, catalysing, often of
sneak-thieves. When I discovered no lixed abode but moving from one place
Paracelsus'Creed, 'l am different, let this to another and one principle to another
not upset you,' there was no turning back. like the hermaphrodite. I began to see
i was born on his birth date, just as I was alchemy as a spiritual silk road with
born on the death date of my other great staging-posts at intervals through time
hero, Jalal al-Din Rumi. poring over books and space: the pyramids, Stonehenge,
in many a monastic library, I absorbed al1 Gothic cathedrals, libraries and certain
I could of the pillars of alchemy: Zosimos, cities. During the Dark Ages the esoteric
Paracelsus, Rhazes, Moses de Leon, alchemical life was a quiet undercurrent to
(
--f
Maimonides - and the books they used: the Vandals and crusades, the sackings
the Zohar, Pimander, p[cqtnx
- and the and burnings and destruction ofbooks.
outstanding patrons: Caliph Al Ma,amun Alchemy transmitted some great intangible
of Baghdad, Frederick II of Sicily, Alfonso truth: 'As above, so below' according to
X of Castille and Rudolph II of Bohemia. the Emerald Tablet, demonstrating rhat rhe
Dignitarles or sick desperadoes, they all microcosmos of man's life is paralleled in
had a vested interest in fostering the the lile of the universe. The transmitters of
occult sciences. alchemy were the unsung heroes of
history: the Presocractics, the
It dawned on me that this vast ry4hagoreans, the Sabians, Copts and
agglomeration of strivings that is alchemy Syrlac Nestorians. They were unsung
could not be sustained by individuals because they vowed secrecy. I11 fate has
a1one. Just as tradesmen had their guilds olten belallen alchemists who betrayed
and scientists their Royal Society, alchemy powerful secrets. In modern times one
too must surely have needed frameworks remembers Fulcanelli and his crew, who
for protection and motivation. Behind the had the alchemical magistry of nuclear
surface of Renaissance politics and fission.
orthodox religion were signs of secret
brotherhoods. A fleuron here, a pair of In systematizing this dictionary, I have
compasses there, were indications of tried to balance entrles on the laboratory
networks ol Rosicrucians, Freemasons, Operations and well-known alchemists
Familists and printing fraternities who with entries on the framework that made
backed alchemists and disseminated their alchemy possible: the brotherhoods, the
work, continuing the traditions from sacred places, the transmitters, collectors
antiquity ol the pythagoreans, and patrons, the texts and publishers, and
Therapeutics, Gnostics, Kabbalists and something ol the language, including
Brethren of Purity. But there was never cabalistic and glyphic. Most essentially, I
one single School olAlchemy in the sense have laid significant emphasis on pictures
of a monastic school. There were, and emblems, which are keys to much of
however, laculties where alchemy was what I did not understand. years of
studied at university, notably Krakow. meditative selfl-discipline has given me
lntraduction

enormous respect lor the subject matter I lortnight belore being 'mined' with kniie
have re-rraced r,r,ith my pen, largely lrom or stilus.
old manuscript lacsimiles. i lind it
humbling and uplilting - not ro say Fina11y, my subiect demands a sense of
exacting - to re-trace the hand of Dee or humour. As Scott Buchanan remarked in
Newton. It is an alchemical process ln The Portable Plrto.'scholars have never
itseli. The forms are theirs - the alchemists been able to view philosophy with
and their engravers - but I have made anything but a long pedantic flace.' Such
them mine. In the ordinary run ol things, pedantry as weighs dorvn the saturnine
to copy another's line or shape is what not allegories of alchemy, such yearnings lor
to do. But in alchemy, the re-creating of a elixirs, such potterings with semen and
lorm is like a mandala or prayer. My dung, such anxiety for secrecy and such
colour plates included in the book can also gibberish resultant therefrom - all these
be looked on as alchemical in make-up. cali lor a touch ol Jove, of airy levity. It
The process is akin to Turkish has ever been my intent to save alcheml,
chamoletting, which Francis Bacon lrom gibberish (most litting alchemical
describes inhis Sylva Sylvarum of 1627.1 word, now sadly debased, lrom Geber the
float the pigments (earth) on various respected collective) and to give it a
liquids (water), submit them to spirits and lightsome respectability in the face ol the
acids (fire), which interact with the new physics.
atmosphere (air) and the painting surfaces
(wood or metal). These surfaces are laid Dlana Fernando
out in the sun for a day and in shade lor a London 1997
 Al:h:mI
To deline alchemy rvithout being irreverent or
The Magnum Opus or
pompous is well nigh impossible, but this
Great \,Vork of AIchemy.
dictionary is an attempt to do so. Alchemy is The delv and brearh of
one ol the four esoteric paths to enlightenment, heaven descend upon a
along with Magia, astrology and Kabbalah, flor'ver representing first
enacted on two precisely corresponding levels: mafier (prlma mat€r[a).
The solar rays pour
1 physical - the rransformation and purilying dorvn on a rose (the
of metals; rose of Sharon), n hile
the lunar rays touch a
2 metaphysical the transformation and
lil),(rhe lily of
purilying of men.
Iehosaphat). The1, mssg
at the apex ol the
inverred triangle and
Alchemy leads to perlection on all planes, by flolv forth as the Sap of
the separating and ,death, of the body, the sun and moon,
follor,ved by a rejoining ol the purified parts, producing the three
this time in perfect proporrion, via the Phliosophic Principles
(r,r,hich generate the
translorming powers olearth, water, fire, air
elements, metals,
and ether, soul and spirit - i.e. evolution minerals and planers):
speeded up b1r p3n. N1erc;ry .i, Sulphura,
In the past, the path of alchemy rvas and Salt f .
embarked upon both as a physical process in
the laboratory and as a spiritual journey like
The PtQrtm's Progress. At the laboratory level,
the time of Moses influenced visionary or
the main operations were: calcination, spiritual alchemy through Kabbalah. The
sublimation, fusion, crystallization and correspondences between the ES/ptian
distillation. theogony and the Kabbalistic sephiroth are
Alchemy employs gradual heat continuously strlking. Wirhin recorded history, nearly all the
and carefully, hence dung, peat and rushes alchemical texts start with the Alexandrians of
',vere used. Chemlstl employs more violent the early Christian era.
heat: it is a quicker process. Nuclear fission is a In the Easr, in India and China, alchemy
form of alchemy; ir certainly blor,vs things started with medicine and meditation. There
apart. Unlortunately for our planet, it does not are references to alchemical processes in the
put them together again.
Nei Chlng (The Yellow Emperor,s Book of
The origins ol alchemy are difficult to Medicine), whose origin is lost in the dlm past.
ascertain as there was no set code of pracrice. However, it may well be that alchemy as an art
ln the \,\rest, alchemy probably grer,v lrom was not practlsed in the East until the great
Egrptian metallurg, and glass-making on rhe concourses of oriental and Indian intellectuals
one hand, and the pyramid mysteries and at Baghdad under the Caliph Al lita,amun
initlation rites on the other. There is, moreover, (reigned 813-83J) and the Arabian bearers of
a strong likelihood rhar rhe Jews in Erypt fiom alchemical r,visdom.
 Alchemystical

Etymologically, there are various confused

theories as to the origins of ,alchemy,. Its "l:tu1
fabled Eg,ptian origin is through the Arabic ,el A term shifted by Paracelsus at his own whim
kimya', from the ES/ptian ,keme,, black earth _ lrom 'black eye paint' (Arabic 'al-koh1') to
i.e. the life-giving soil of, the Nile inundarions. 'spirit of wine', where it has stuck from that
According to the Alexandrian alchemists, day to this. When set alight, this 'fire water,
'keme'was the original matter to which all means 'union of above and below,; flre
metals must be reduced before they turned to ascends, water descends. See also Emerald
gold. According to the French archaeologist Tablet.
,keme,
Jacques-Joseph Champollion, is a
transliteration ol'Chemi', E$/pt, a name the
Alembic
Hebrews translated as 'Land ol Cham,.
'Chema' is the title ol a basic work cited by From the Arabic 'al-ambiq', still or still-head.
the fourth-century Greek alchemist Zosimos.
Just as calcination gave rise to much diversity
Another source may be ,Alchymy,, an older of furnace, so distillation did for a parallel
word than 'alchemy', which is derived from the array of stills, which usually consisted of a
Greek word meaning 'casting, commingling', as flask to conrain the liquid to be distilled and a
found in Greek alchemical rexts of practical still-head with a delivery spout. Zosimos
recipes for the Tincture and the philosopher's prescribes thar the still-head should fit closely
Stone or for ultimate Essence ol a thing. These on to the earthenware vessel containing the
texts, which are lound mostly among the third_ mauer to be distilled and the joint should be
and fourth-century Gnostic literature, reveal a luted with flour-paste.
mystical nostalgia for salvation. Later, special lutings were highly
That alchemy was abolished from Egrpt in recommended; made lrom stone-free clay, dried
.a.n292 under the decree olDiocletian is dung and chopped hair, the mixture was
signiflicant. It was a potent threat: ,These known as Philosopher's Clay or Clay ol
alchemists all speak ol something other than Wisdom. See also Zosimos.
just the laboratory level.'

ll_f9i:ii: libt:"
1l:h:'"{:li:11 The most remarkable of the scientific works
Meaning 'alchemical', this adjective was used under King Alfonso X's parronage of Arabian
by the modern alchemist Frarer Albertus, learning. These tables were lists of planetary
implylng its connection with ,mystes, or movements that formed the basis of modern
initiates, as in the Greek Eleusinian mvsleries. scientific astronomy. They r,vere prepared under ---i:-
Allonso's direct command by two 1earned .[ews
at Toledo: .[udah ben Moses Cohen, a physician,
r:di:ll:l and Isaac ben Sid, aHazan or overseer in the
"l'li',:l:::l:: synagogue. The tables would have been closely
An oval medal,40 x3Tcm (15,/o x 141l:in), consulted before astrological and alchemical t ,+--'
weighing 7kg (3lb), now in the Operations.
Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. The
upper third ol this medal is silver, while the
lower two-thirds are solid gold, allegedly ^l-rg':9I I!r?) -!!)
transmuted in 16TT by the ex-Augusrinian Knolvn as El Sabio, or The Wise. Alfonso was
monk Wenzel Seiler, and his patron, alchemy King of Castille (reigned 1252-84). polirically
mad Emperor Leopold I of Germany. weakened by his imperial aspirations, he was

10
 Alles ,44lst
ffi.='--'
Y., .
,o

intellectually outstanding, not only lor his Book

means that the gold rvas dissohred in aqna
oJChess but for his promorion of philosophy
regta (roval water), and that the gold probably
and astronomy and translations ol Eastern
contained copper, which r,vould colour the acid
alchemical and scientilic thought into
bluish-green.
Castillian, via a number ollewish translators,
rvho were conversant r,vith the Arabic texts,
in
the tradition ol the earlier Spanish Muslim and
lewish scholars. See also Algazel; picatrix.

*Y:n
:t \ro:i-11il]
A Persian Muslim philosopher lrom Nishapur,
surnamed'Hujjatu-l-lslam, (lslam,s conrzincing
proot), who did lor Islam l,vhat Thomas
Aquinas did for Christianity. His works were
turned into Latin from the Arabic by the
There are aliegories about kings and Inrerlacing Chinese
ceaseless collaboration ofAvendeath, the
Jew queens, virgins and hermaphrodites, the Flesh dragons. Chou D1,n2511
of Toledo, and Gundisalvus, who became c. 3008..
of Adam, Diana the Moon-Goddess veiling and
Bishop of Toledo. Algazel's Kimtya al_sa,Gclct
unveiling herselfl; there are mystical n eddings
(Alchemy of Happiness) is typical of the
and unions, ,,vinged chariots, chariots of
spiritual alchemical texts so popular in the
antimony, ships, Argonauts, eggs and
Middle Ages, that derived from the
phoenixes all in a hirre of activity, fixing,
Neoplatonist commentaries on plato's Timaeus
fleeing, rising, bathing, srvallowing, conjoining
and Aristotle's De Anima. See also Aristotle:
rvith or spewing one another. The reason for
Plato; Timaeus.
thls obscure symboiism was a misguided
devotion to the arcane and a need to put ofl
Alg:_:i:_,, everyone except the most devout, or daft,
depending on vrewpoinr.
Derived from Al-Khr.varizmi, who drew up a set
of astronomical tables for calculating the
oll.: *i::
meridian of London - an unlikely place lor this !1ll l-:T::::ll
ninth-century Arabian alchemist lrom Toledo to
A pun implied in pieter Bruegel the Elder,s pen
choose !
drawing ol The Alchemlsl (sixteenth century).
This is not a picture of learned men practising
Al.klhesl the magical art in the interest of knotr,ledge but
ol idiot peasants obsessed with the idea ol
A paracelsan sham-Arabic coinage for
instant tvealth.
'universal solvent,, the first magnetic
agent. The laboratory is a ramshackle kitchen
lvhere the children run riot. one has a cooking
oll"s:', pot wedged on its head so cannot see. A Fool
fans the fire while undertaking his alchemical
The essence of alchemlcal literature; its vast
Operation of transmuting metals into coins.
compendia teem with animated metals lions,
only the cynical doctor ar the left of the picture
red and white, eagles, dogs, rvolves, peacocks
realizes the stupidity of it all; he sits at a desk
and dragons. For instance, a dog devoured by a pointing to the volume open in lront of him.
wol I sign i lies puri licarion ol gold by an ri mony,
The tltle reads Alghe-Mtst, a play on rhe words
Sol or Sun devoured by the green dragon 'alchemist' and 'alles mist'.
Aludel

ol,*l l\,ledea casts her spells

The alchemical vessel, called variously the

Hermetic Vase, Vase ol the philosophy, and
Philosopher's Egg in which the Great Work was
consummated.

oll-
A fixative. Medea was said to have concocted
alchemical dyes, into which she threlv alum,
together tvith blue vitriol and blood, making ,a
Iake, a mordant, clarilying the seething brew'.

Amllntho:
Almost identical with asbestos and mica,
according to Ruland inhis Lexicon Alchimtae ol
1.612.lt was rhe 'incombusrible paper' from
which were made 'everlasting books', such as
those found, supposedly, in the Vault ol
Christian Rosencreutz, the labled founder ol write an Everlastlng Book \,\,ith letters of gold.
the Rosicrucian Orders. A story is told olX,,tarco An eighteenth-century commentator, Adam
Antonio Castagne, the artist, who found a great Booz, laments:
quantity of amianthos stones in mines in Italy. If the famed incombustible oil were
From these stones he prepared incombustible discovered once again, everlasting lamps
paper, skins and lamp-wicks and promised to and eternal lire would become ours.

Everlasting, ever-burning lamps r,vere f,requent

among the Ancients.

Ana.Bneqi.q

The doctrine oi being able to remember a

previous existence. In his 'magic parable', the
Monas Hleroglyphica, about man's r6le in the
universe and his ascent to God, lohn Dee
contemplates man's spiritual translormation
and the r,vays in which man can release himself
from his body and return to his original divine
nature.
Dee hints that he has had direct mystical
contact with the Divine, and that through
anamnesis he has been blessed with learning
the Gnostic secrets of ancient magi, which he
can now pass on to others. See also Dee;
Gnostics.
 Android

A1ytlw ota1tu!?,n A:1.svl: it +i:.

A vast work on morbid psycholog, The hermaphrodite, half_man, halfl-r,voman,

by that
eccenrric cleric, Robert Burton (15TT_1640). symbolically gelled in perfect union.
See also
The earlier editions conrain sympathetic Rebis.
references to the lraternity of ,St
Roses Crosse,
and to alchemists.
Burton may indeed have been
a
!:di,:!
Rosicrucian; his beloved books in A robot, said by the seventeenth_centurv
his libran,
are variously inscribed with The shadou, ol the
sigils,s and alchemist Michael Maier to have been
Rosicrucian Andreae
Rosicrucian dots ... and the constructed by the sage Albertus
three roses sign Magnus hovers over the 1 690
rrr, which was commonly used in the (1193-1280). Endowed with rhe power translation of his
seventeenth century to denote
ol
alchemical speech, the android took J0 years ChJnilcdl Weddtng,
ro create. It
societies. Many of Burton,s books proved an inlallible oracle, answering lvhile Adam and Eve
\,vere on every
magic, necromancy and the Rosicrucian symbolize the
question put to it.
alchemical conjunction
controversy.

k:!::?"., y:!::::i !f liiil

|?h?y:
'The Rosicrucian, who
was not a Rosicrucian,
the alchemist, who was not an
alchemist., This
alchemist and occultist, and native
of
Wrirttemberg, whose reigning
duke r,vas
Frederick I, is best known f,or
his alchemical
allegory, The Chymical luedding
oJChrtsrian
Rosencreutz. published in 1616,
ihe allegory
took the lorm of a romanricized
spirituai
pilgrimage, with the hero, christiin
Rosy Cross,
OMANC
being invited to a Royal Wedding, O N, THE
and
experiencing over seven days not
onl1, the
CH TMIC AL )

/-(
actual wedding in the wondrous
heraldic and chivalric marvels and
castie full of
activities
WEDDING {
but, more importantly, the alchemical I

,u,riug.
k,jl.lin
I

of the soul. In flact, on the sixth

Rosencreutz witnesses an experiment
day, Christiai hish
Clnfifan Eo[gnrrrurl.
D;;[E l !

in which
alchemists, toiling hard over
their lurnaces.
succeed in crearing Iife. in rhe Tranl].2ged by E. Foxcrofi,late
lorm olrhe Fellow of
alchemical Bird. Finall,v, on the xrngs Colledge'.o Canhidjc.
seventh day,
Rosencreutz is sent on his way
with his ba;d ertrnteq& E
of lollorvers. like the Argonaurs, in tred according ro{p1D(f
discover new lands. The island
ships ro a/cAfin.-ffilllllfr-
discover is the one on which Andreae,s
thar he does ooo
stands, and lvhich he writes about
Utopia T0r
in his book,
A D es crip tlo n oJ t he Rep ub I tc oJ
See also Chemical Wedding; palatinate.
Ch ri s ti an op o I is . :##,,Hi,yt4;*otrl;fi
at y 4t u ,,i. Ci i' A
W
;;";i i; :;li; ;;f ;; !.

-
 Ankh

According to one source, it was destroyed by thinking they r'vould thrive on the herb
Magnus's pupil, Sr Thomas Aquinas, just as containing it, just as the monastery pigs did.
primitive Scholasticism was destroyed by Fortunately, it cannot have killed them a1l, for
Aquinas's great theological commentary, the once Valentine had perlected the Tincture of
Stunma Theologlca. Or perhaps St Thomas r,vas Antimony, it cured sufferers of VD. It rvas also
just jealous. the secret ol the inimitable stained glass in
Gothic cathedrals. See also Chartres;
Ankh Dodecahedron; Rose Windows; \ralentine.

The hieroglyphT or 'crux ansata', which A:rabi;

represents the ascendency ol spirit over the
cross of matter. This symbol was the basis ol The language of a vast amount ol alchemical
John Dee's alchemicai discourse, the,L,lonas material in the so-cal1ed Dark Ages rhat had
Hteroglyphica, and the learned cerman Jesuit come up through the Alexandrian Greeks, the
Egyptologist, Athansius Kircher (1602-80), Neoplatonisrs ol the lirst centuries AD, then the
commented on it as a r,vorld system. ln the Nestorians in Constantinople, and later in
ancient rvorld, figures of Hermes Trismegistus Edessa and later still in Persia. The Nestorians
are sometimes shor,vn tvith an ankh in one rvere rve11 received and set up rheir scientific
hand and a caduceus or serpent-staff in the centre and academy in lundeshapur. Here,
other. See also Dee. under the great King Chosroes Nushirwan
(reigned 531 79), the city became rhe mosr
important intellectual centre of the time. Greek
flimoll scholars (expelled after lustinian closed the
The universal alkahest, indispensable to philosophical schools in Athens in 529)
alchemists. Paracelsus observed 'As antimony converged here and met Syrian, Persian, Indian
refines gold so, in the same way, and under the and lewish sages. Later, under the Abbasids in
same form, it refines the body.' It is rhe only the eighth and ninth centuries, with the
metal that r'vorks on all the organs, and it is founding of the library and translation school
governed by all the planets, nhereas most at Baghdad, came the great flowering ol the
melals are governed by jusr one, as gold is by lslamic Renaissance.
The arrangemenr of
the sun and silver by the moon. It was known Much ol the Greek lr,isdom on medicine,
atoms in turo tt,pes of
antirnonlr, seen under
to the Ancients -]ezebel used it on her eyes - philosophy and alchemy was translated again,
trance conditions by but made popular by Basil Valentine, that either direct lrom the Greek into Arablc or from
theosophist .\nnie pseudonymous Benedictine lvho innocently Greek into Syriac (neo-Aramaic), and then into
Besant and collea.gues killed off his monks rvith it ('anti-moine'), Arabic or Persian. See also Aramaic; Baghdad;
lundeshapur; Nestorians.

n'?y?i:
A Semitic language, wrlrten in Hebrew script.
Some parts ol the Old Testament were rvritten
in Biblical Aramaic or Chaldean, and many of
the midrashim, or commentaries on the Bible
were Aramaic. So was the Zohar, that magnum
opus ol Spanish-Jewish Kabbalah, which
appeared in the thirteenth century. But the
Aramaic prose ol the Zoharbroke a1l the rules
 Argonauts

of grammar, and its inventor, Moses de Leon, Rudolph II of Bohemia. The Arcana
wrote in a highly lanciiul mixture ol Hebrew Arcan[ssima is a discourse in six books devoted
and Aramaic, with liberal literary borrowings to interpreting Egyptian and Greek mytholo$/
from Babylonian and Talmudic sources. in alchemical terms.
One of the branches of Aramaic was Syriac,
the literary language ol the Christians and Archidoxis magica
Gnostics ol northern Syria and Mesopotamia. It
was through this ianguage that much ol the That part ol the Philosophia Magna that.
Alexandrian alchemical material was conveyed encompasses Paracelsus's cosmological and
into Arabic, centuries before it reached the spiritual vision of the nature of God and
Latins in medieval Europe. creation.
The 'phllosophy' is divided into 'nine
members': magica (wil1 por,ver), astrologica (the
^1i1rl spiritual influences and their reactions),
As in The Arbatel oJ )lagic , thought to be part signatum (the knowledge of the inner essence
of the forged fourth book of the huge as obtained through outward signs),
compilation, On Occult Philosophy (1528) by nigromantia (apparitions), necromantia
Cornelius Agrippa. Whoever the author, the (second sight), artes incertae (the arts of the
Arbatel heads the sixth section oi the Harley imagination and insplration), medicina adepta
manuscript 6482, which is called De Magia (the occult science of supernatural cures),
Veterum (The Magic of the Ancients). It is rea11y philosophia adepta lthe wisdom of
a practical handbook lor the summoning of alchemistical skill and contemplation based on
angels via incantations and Enochian tables. the science ol the supernaturall and
Etymologically,'arbatel' probably connects mathematica adepta (the science of occult
with the Semitic root, 'arba', 'four', hence 'the relations, geometry, cosmography, measures,
lourth book', bur alchemists were so given to weights, numbers). The Archidoxis Mag[ca
phonetic leaps that the word could well link explores these same themes in inlricate and
with the Arabic and Persian 'arabah-t-e1', the subtle detail, in language that is strikingly
Arabian wheeled chariot, the 'vehicle of magic' graphic yet strangely biblicai. This work
by lvhich, with the help ol the summoned epitomizes Paracelsus's mature philosophy of
angels, the soul could ascend through the the years 1537 39. not long belore his death.
heavenly spheres and sephirotic paths to God.
See also Cornelius Agrippa; Enoch; Yorede A1_9_:"_1"1:
Merkabah.
The men who sailed in the ship,'lrgo with
A::iii Jason to Coichis to recover the Golden Fleece
have been likened to alchemists rvho embarked
Secret remedies, of which Paracelsus was on the quest for go1d. The Argonauts spoke the
monarch. language of their ship, 'argot', slang or cant or
secret language. They were thought to be a
dylna 'tr1a1:::i*: secret brotherhood, as were the Rosicrucians
centuries later and the chivalric order of the
The Most Secret oJsecrets, published in 1614, Golden Fleece, instituted by Philip III of
was the first treatise of Michael Maier, the Burgundy in 1429. Even the Hermetic
greatest of literary alchemists, who started olf Bohemian, Rudolph II, was invested with the
as a Lutheran in Holstein and later became chain of the order in 1585 in Prague. The Argo
physician-alchemist to the raving Emperor was built of the fabled oak timber lrom the
 Aristotle

shrine ol the oracle at Dodona in Greece; it was in E$,pt to the East. His Categorles, Orgcnon
the speaking vessel, the ship of the mysteries and De Interpretatlone were translated into
of Isis, the philosophic 'egg' of dirrine Latin by Boethius in the fifth century, and his
alchemical rene\,val. See also Colchis; metaphysical works were translated into Arabic
Rudolph II. by the translators in the new school of
philosophy in Baghdad under the Abbasid ruler
Al Ma'amun in the ninth century. Under this
ti:i:iT t:::..??i,) enlightened caliph, the Syriac Nestorian,
An Athenian philosopher, the pillar of medieval Hunayn, translated a phenomenal number of
alchemy, transmogrilied by the Neoplaronists. medical and philosophical treatises, including
Of all the Ancients, it was Aristotle, along with Aristotle's. Alter Hunayn, the next greatest
Plato, who exercised the greatest influence on codifier olAristotle rvas Avicenna (980 lOiZ),
Aristotle, after a alchemists throughout the ages. He was u,idel)z son of a Persian civil servant. Thereafter,
filteenth-century interpreted by the Alexandrians and by the Aristotle travels on through the Arabians and
German \'\,oodcul Nestorian Christians who had fled persecution jews to Spain in the eleventh century via
Avicebron, Averroes, Maimonides and thence
to Aquinas, who Christianizes him and lets him
loose among monks and alchemists of Europe.

AT:ii.
The red mineral realgar As, S, and the yellow
mineral, orpiment, rvere known to the
Ancients and used in medicinal and magical
cures. The flifth-century Greek alchemist,
Olympiodoros, described white arsenic
(arsenious oxide As, O;).

nsnmol311 t:11':::i
A living memorial to thar old mole, Elias
Ashmole, whose anriquarian burrowings for
bibliographies led to the pearls of alchemical
texts he collected in his vast Theatrum
Chemlcun Britannicum (printed in 1652, no\,v
in the Bodleian Library, Oxflord).
As the tersely torvering A.E. Waite wrote:
'Those rvho knew Ashmole will be aware that a
mystical understanding of alchemy lay far
beyond his measures.' Apparently, Ashmole
'knew enough to hold his tongue, but on his
own confession not enough to speak; who was
therefore by profession an amateur as regards
the Art (of alchemical rransmutation), an
antiquary and editor as regards some of its
memorials'. But Ashmole did believe he had
received lrom his adept and individual master
 Atctlanta Fugi€ns

the Secret olthe Great Work. This ,master,

was, emblems illustrate the mythical Atalanta, r,vho
according to Ashmole's Dlaries, one William
could outrun all her suitors, but who was
Backhouse. Ashmole lived for 40 years
alter caught by Hippomenes (helped by Aphrodite)
this great evenr. and pursued his researches
as who dropped three irresisrible apples. one bv
an anriquary, although there is not the leasr
one, in her path. Through her stopping to pick
reason t0 suppose that he proceeded
to anv them up, Hippomenes catches her up and
laborarory pracrice ol alchemy.
ravishes her in a cave, where, through
Aphrodite's jealousy, they are turned into lions.
Alchemically, Atalanta is the fleeing Mercury,
lixed by Hippomenes, the golden Sulphur.
When the two substances con.ioin in the glass
Elias Ashmole vessel, they form the royal red Tincture. The
pictures remind one of Holbein's biblical
woodcuts, and early Italian flattened
architectural vistas, but they are also strangely
surrealistic, with people and objects suspended
in odd attitudes representing alchemical
processes. Emblem 24 shows a king
being
eaten by a r,volf, while in the background the
king has revived and is prancing offfrom the
flames in which the rvolf is now burning.
Emblem 2 shows a woman with a bloated
globe lor a body, suckling a child from the
geographical contours of her breasts. Emblem
1, entitled 'The rvind has carried him in his
belly', depicts the male rvind Boreas with a
womb, in which can be seen a floetus. Emblems
1 and 2 both illustrate the aphorisms of I/ze
Emerald Tablet oJ Hermes Trismegis tus,
concerning the nature of the philosopher,s
nl1l11l1Eusfeni Stone. Maier draws lar-fetched parallels
between mytholos/ and alchemy, and he aims
A rather extraordinary alchemical allegory
by at harmonizing it all with the musical
Michael Maier, published in 1618 at
accompaniment, which is for three voices:
Oppenheim at the expense olJohann de
Brv. 'Atalanta, or the fleeing voice ... Hippomenes,
On the highly decorative title_page, Maier
or the pursuing voice, and the apple in the
explains Drgidly in Latin the purpose of
path, or the delaying voice., Maier is not
Atalqnta Fleelng, that is, New Chemlcal a very
accurate composer, but he apologizes to the
oJthe Secrets oJNature. tr is ,parrly
:mbl:ms reader and asks him to amend the slips for
lor the eyes and intellect, and ,partly foi
the himsell.
ears and the soul,s recreation,. The
eyes and lncidentally, the original format olthe lirst
the intellect feast upon the so magicai
edition was octavo, with its page dimensions
engravings and epigrams. I,vhich take
up 50 obeying the humanistic Golden Section of the
right-hand pages ol the double_spreads,
while ratio 2:3. When both the left_hand page and
the ears are transported by the 50 musical
the right-hand page are contemplated rogether
lugues notated on the 50 left_hand pages,
and as a spread, the ratio becomes J:4. So, the
presumably the soul contemplates
all. The general formula olthe book is in the four
 Athanor
r
\:.
i

related elements 2:3 ::3:4, or octavo is to of mercury and sulphur. This Islamic genius
quarto, or male is to femaie. passed into legend, immortallzed by one ol his
own long-life elixirs. See also Philosophic
A:h1l:1 Mercury, Salt and Sulphur; Prima Materia.

From the Arabic 'al-tannur', one ol the three Azolh

essential apparatus of the alchemist, a
calcinatory lurnace that aliows coke to burn one ol the many allases ol myrionymous
very slowly. The other two important apparatus mercury, a corruption of 'al-zauq' (Arabic for
were the retort, sometimes called the the metal mercury), but considered to have
philosopher's egg (a glass vessel with a long, great occult power because it is a cabalistic
down-bent neck lor heating mercury for acronym of the lirst and iast letters ol the
purification) and the crucible (an earthenware Greek, Arabic, Roman and Hebrew alphabets: A
melting-pot for metals). and Z, a and o (o long), N and ll; thus AZoll
beginning and end, the Universal Medicine. In
Avicenna alchemical jargon, 'the azoth of the
(b. 980 at Afsana, near Bukhara; d. 1037) philosophers is their mercury' bizatrely
becomes: 'M. the azothi aoelth epuhiloqo-
This 'Aristotle of the Arabians' (in fact a sophersa lisati ptheiruri imeracurerty.' Nothing
Persian), who was taught arithmetic by a like putting off idle seekers!
Avicenna, after a detail
from the title-page of greengrocer, became a court physician at 1 7
his rvorks published in and later a grand vizier to a certain Shams (slc)
Venice (1544). at Hamadan. There he proliferated, literally: his
million-word Can o n amalgamated
AZOTH,
LE MOYEN DE }'AIRE,
Aristotellan biologr with
OV
1'Or cachd des PhilofoPhes.
Hippocratic medicine. Among
De Ffi,reBafleValeian
hls 760-strong hoard of
drugs, he mentions
mandragora and ,ldily!*s
cannabis. In shrervd
Muslim alchemical
tradition, he accepts
the transmutation of
metals; he also
aflirms that
philosophical (i.e.
alchemical) gold is
better than mined
gold; that everything
consists ol the four
elements: that these
are constituted of
the first matter; that
Azoth. the tree of Universal lilatter bearing the seven
they can change into metals and planets and (1ower triangle) the symbols ol
one another; that Sulphur=, Mercury i, and Salt/Bod)y'Four Elements E
every metal consists The adept Senior initiates his disciple Adolphus'
 was welcomed among the 2O,0OO lews there
and wrote his description of Babylon, probably
lr,ithout visiting the 'Torver of the Dispersed
Generation', so wild were his accounts of the
3OO-metre (1000ft) high tower, which had been
uul,r:11 'split to its very foundations' by the heavenly
fire that had struck it.
The home of Geonic Kabbalah and, since time
immemorial, home to alchemists ol totally
Bach, fohann Sebastian (1685-1250)
different backgrounds: Nabateans, Chaldeans,
Jelvs, Syriac Nestorians, persians and Arabs. 'This composer ... used music in its law linked
Historically, ferv outsiders reached to mathematics ... for the restoration of balance
Babylonia from the West, situated as it was ... The effect is that while listening to his
between the inaccessible Tauros and Tagros music, the salt, sulphur and mercury
Mounrains, 4572 meffes (15,OOOfr) high, which equilibrium is resrored in the biological
guarded rhe source of the Tigris, the great and structures of plants, animals and humans.' So
mythical river that meandered irs 1850 believes Theo Gimbel, the sound and colour
kilometres (1150 miles) down past the ruined therapist.
sites ol ziggurats and Babylon to modern
Baghdad and the alluvial plains ol the persian
Backhouse, William
Gulf.
Renaissance travellers from Europe did not ll l').::Yiy ,?r-:,! ,: *?y :?")
travel for travel's sake, they were usually the Elias Ashmole's teacher in alchemy, who
mllitary, or merchants, or mystics. The Hanging confided to him the root secret concerning
Gardens ol Babylon and the splendours of fable 'materia prima'. According to Ashmole's
on the whole remained just that: fablel Dlaries, William Backhouse is first mentioned
Anything connected wirh Babylon was ro the on 1 3 April 1 65 1 and described as being ol
early Christian Fathers a symbol of corruption, Sr,vallowfield in Berkshire. On rhis date he
like Sodom. caused his pupil to 'call him Father
The best philosophical accounr ol Babylon thenceforrvard'.
was by the Spanish .[ervish rvanderer, Rabbi Ashmole notes on 1O fune 1651 that his
Benjamin, rvho in 1160 set out to visir rhe site teacher had communicated many secrets to him
rvhere his lorefathers had sullered exile by the and, on 10 October 1 65 1 : 'This morning my
rivers of Babylon. He certainly must have Father Backhouse opened himsell very freely,
encountered a hotch-potch ol people at Mosul, touching the Great Secret' (i.e. of horv to make
near ancient Nineveh: alchemists,philo_ the alchemical Stone).
sophers, scholars, medicine-men, Kabbalists Finally, on 13 May 165J, Ashmole wrires:
and so on- 'My Father Backhouse l)ring sick in Fleer Street,
He took a year to get there, speedlng over against St Dunstan's Church and not
overland from Constantinople, but was then so knon ing whether he should lirre or die, about
relieved to pur his blistered leet up that he eleven of the clock, told me in syllables the
floated down the Tigris to Baghdad without True Matter ol the philosopher,s Stone.,
actually looking very hard at the extraordinary Thereaf,ter Backhouse quietly passed a.,vav.
earth-mounds and ruined cities along rhe
littoral.
At Saghdad, still a seething centre of Pi:k*T9 ::isuis-:
alchemy, medicine, marhematics and optics, he One of the ways, along with cryptic language,

19
Bccon, Franc[s

symbols and anagrams, of keeping ofl the l4etaphysics (1266)he quotes freely from the
profane and presen,ing secrecy. The alchemical alchemists Isaac Israeli and Petrus Alphonsi.
instruction 'Take that matter you well know', The application of alchemy in the extension of
becomes 'Wonk ilew ouy rettam taht ekat.' human life was another subject of study with
Bacon: 'The glory of going on and still to be.'
FI1i'i? In this connection he menlions Artephius,
Bul-1-1:
l' ?:
-' u?
? ?) an early Latin alchemical writer ol uncertain
A scientist, alchemist, freemason and date and origin (perhaps A1 Toghrai, the Arabic
visionary, Bacon bestrides the rvorld of the poet and alchemist who died about 1119).
Renaissance magical imagination and the New Inhis De Potestate.l[irabili Artis et Naturqe
Age of Reason. He is both a Utopian, as in his Bacon gives an alchemical instruction:
New Atlqntis, discovered alter his death in
Take salt and rub it diligently rvith water,
1626, afid a realist, as inhis Advancement oJ
and purily it in other waters. Afterwards by
Learning (1605), advocating a matter-ofl-lact
diverse contritions, rub it with salts and
method ol scientific research. Yet this same
burn it rvith sundry assation, that it may be
realist planned and produce d the l,lasque oJ the
made a pure earth, separate from the other
l[iddle Temple a.nd Lincoln's Inn that Francis
elements. Understand me, il thou art able:
Beaumont had written in preparation lor the
lor it shall be composed undoubtedly of the
marriage oi Frederick V ol the Palatinate and
elements, and therefore it shall be a part of
Elizabeth, daughter of ames I - the wedding
.f
the Stone rvhich is no Stone and is in every
ol all weddings, symbolic ol the alchemical
man; which thou shalt find at all times ol
union of Rhineland and Thames.
the year in its own Place.
Bacon's life's aims are summed up in his
New Atlantis - a safe Christian island of
Bacon believed that the Stone was composed of
brotherly 1ove, Rosicrucian Brothers in all but
the lour elements, as \vere all things e1se,
name, n hich houses a great college called
including human beings. Elsewhere in this
Salomon's House, which is parallel to the
tract, Bacon defines alchemy as the Science ol a
Invisible College ol the Rose Cross Fraternity
certain Medicine or Elixir by which metals are
where priest-scientists conduct their researches
transformed into other metals and those which
into advanced arts and sciences. They remain
are imperfect are raised into a perlect state.
invisible to the outside world but sal1y forth
every 12 years to glean information, both
esoteric and scientific and to act in saintly
fashion, harmonizing and healing in the world
outside. See also Andreae; Palatinate;
Roger Bacon
Rosicrucians; Utopia,

uuf-ll: Rog?i
ll"1 l!)
A Franciscan monk, knorvn as the 'Doctor
Mirabilis', Bacon was the lirst great exponent
of the methods of positive science, lvhich he
applied particularly to the study oflanguage:
Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, Chaldean/Aramaic.
He was lamiliar not only lvith Aristotle's
Physics and Metaphysics, but also Avendeath,
Gundisalvus and Avicebron. In his On

20
 Baghdad

The secrets of philosophy are hidden

in the Holy Roman), caliphates or emirates.
four elements, Mercury and Sulphur
and the At Baghdad serrled the greatest ninth_
principles of all metals, says Bacon
in his century alchemisrscholar, Hunayn, who
Speculum AlchemiGe, and the intention
of Iooked after the newly founded library. Here
nature is to produce gold, but ,many
accidents the alchemists Avicenna, Al Kwarizmi, and
inreryene'. He apparently lelt a ciphered
Rhazes came to study among the papyri
manuscript r,vith a formula for making
copper. rescued from Byzantium and the scientific
In the library of pennsylvania Universitv
is a scrolls ofsufis and naturalists.
retort and a certificate dated t Oecember
tgZO. In this clty gathered the secret brotherhood
This retort contains metallic copper
made ol alchemical philosophers banned bv the
according to a secret formula of Roger -
Bacon. orthodox in Baghdad - knor,vn as the Brethren
Michael Maier printed a picture of Bacon
in ol Purity. Their tenth-century labour of love
a cloak, with rveighing scales, lor his
Symbola was to compile an encyclopedia of 52 treatises
Aureqe l,[ensqe Duodecim Nafionem
of 1617. on the sciences, encompassing eafthquakes,
wiLh rhe rongue-in-cheek motro. .No
one rvho minerals, tides, and the elements, all examined
sails West can reach the East.,
in connection with the celestial spheres and rhe
Spurred on by the success of rhis 161 7
possibility of alchemical rransmuration.
publication, Maier,s publisher reproduced
the Baghdad, right up to its caprure in 1258
same engraving of Bacon the lollowing bv
year in Hulagu, grandson ofGenghis Khan, remained
Maier's Tr[pus Aureus, but this time aisigning a
civilized as14um ol lalsala (philosophy), kalam
the likeness to the alchemist Basil Valentine.
(theology) and rasawwuf (mysticism).
See also Maier; philosopher's
Stone; Valentine.

ra$!1a Baghdad, as laid out the second Abbasid Caiiph Al-

b1,
X,,lansur in AD76J: a perlect circle
with the palace and
The renaissance in Baghdad happened mosque in the centre and residential quarters
four rounr.l the
centuries earlier than in Spain and edge.
eight
centuries earlier than in central EuroDe.
For
scholars, mystics and sclentists from
all over
the Middle East, Baghdad acred rather
like the
melting-pot or crucible that twelfth-cenrurv
Toiedo was to become in Spain or prague
was
to become under Rudolph II in the sixteenth
century.
Under the patronage olthe Abbasid
founders olBaghdad in the eighth
centuryAD,
flourished separare schools olMuslim,
Gieek
and Christian thought; schools of translation,
medicine, alchemy, science, astrology
and
mathematics. The philosophic school,
known
as The House of Wisdom, was founded
here bv
the Abbasid Caliph AI Ma'amun.
There flocked Indians and Orientals
across
the Silk Road, displaced Syriacs from
Antioch,
Jelvs f,rom Byzantium or .[undeshapur,
Nestorians lrom Edessa, all seekers caught
in
the lerment of dissolute empires
lnotably the

)1
 BaIn-mar'|e

uili-iilll churches ol Turkestan and North Africa. which

in turn influenced St Augustine in his early 1ife.
The common-or-garden French steam-pot,
which goes back to the biblical Miriam, Moses,
Bath
sister, otherwise Mary the Jer,vess, who sloshed
her alchemical concoctions around in one. This There were two main types. The first was the
industrious lady, who is also credited with the sand-bath, or athanor, a calcinatory furnace for
invention of the dibikos and the kerotakis, the lirst stage of the alchemical Operation, in
somehow got transferred from Hebrew tradition which the Salt or body of a substance r,vas
to Greek. See also Dibikos: Kerotakis. calcined from the Mercury or essence, and from
the Sulphur or soul.
B?:!":? The other sort was the steam-bath, in which
purilication by vaporizing (often with sulphur
An empress ol uncertain pedigree, the second or mercury as volatile menstruums or catalysts)
wife of Sigismund IIt Vasa, King ol poland took place. In this Emblem fromAtalant(t
(reigned 1587-1632). Fuglens (Atalanra Fleeing), rhe King, or impure
The desperate Barbara, perhaps in a last- gold, is being purified lr,ith his bile while he
ditch effort to restore the raided Treasury before soaks in his bath, and rhe delv washes all the
the collapse of eastern Europe in the Thirty bile away.
Years' 'War, attempted to make coins out ol a Baths and fountains aplenty spray their way
precarious mixture of arsenic and urine (a through allegories ol alchemy. lnhis Allegorie
passable imitation of silver), and gold copper de la Fonta[ne, the geriatric adept Trevisa
and silver (resembling pure gold). rvrites: 'They purge the king in the lountain ...
where he bathes for 282 days' (the length of
Ph1'sician and urine ui1gil:"i ,1? time for all the alchemical processes of matter
flask, afrer a r'r,oodcut ll,?1 to become the Philosopher's Stone). See also
from Bartholomew's One of the early Gnostics from Edessa, where Bernard ol Trevisa.
enc)rclopedia, 1 5 1 8
Syrian, Mesopotamian and Armenian
edition.
influences merged with Christianity under the
kings of the House olAbgar and thought to be
the lather ol Christian Syriac literature,
Bardaisan (sometimes spelled Bardesanes) had
distinct traces of the religion of Zoroaster. He
would have been typlcal of those who
transmitted Byzantlne alchemy from
Alexandria to Constantinople and then Edessa.
In his theory of the origin of the world, God
and the live uncreated elements lived in
harmony: Light rvas in the East, Wind r,vas in
the West, Fire was in the South, \,Vater in rhe
North, and Darkness in the Depth be1ow. But The King in his bath.
orving to some unexplained cataclysm,
Darkness began to emerge and take over. Batman
Hence Evil and the need for the Redeemer,
Jesus Christ. Shakespeare's source for Hebraeo, Arabian
Bardaisan influenced the Persian scholar science I ln 1240, the Franciscan, Bartholomew
Mani (216-276), who in turn influenced the the Englishman, had compiled one of the mosr

22
 Bernard oJClaintaux

r"
1r I l'
.

$l
.at l''
popular encyclopedias on rhe physical sciences, developed into rhe phlogiston theory by his
taken mainly from the English Abbot Alexander pupil Georg Ernst Stahl.
Neckham's Latin translations of Neoplatonist Artributed to Becher is the observation:
alchemist - philosophers such as Algazel. The 'False alchemists seek only to make gold; true
encyclopedia was called On the properties oJ philosophers desire only knowledge. The
Things, and lohn ofTrevisa, the Cornishman, former produce mere tincture, sophistries,
translated it into English in 1398. A century ineptitudes; the latter enquire after the
later it was printed with quaint illustrations bv principles of things.'
Wynkyn de Worde; and almost another..n,r-
later in 1582, itwas re-edited by Batman, and
known simply as Batman upon Bartholome.
*:lli: libtl
This was rhe rext that Shakespeare studied. A bronze and silver tablet, supposedly bought
by Cardinal Bembo after the sack of Rome in
1527, it is engraved with Egrptian hieroglyphs.
-B-:1::: This tablet was inrerpreted as holding the key
One ol the oldest sites for pilgrims ol spiritual to many sacred alphabets.
alchemy, Beauce was ,the land of saints, upon In the centre of the tablet is Isis, iynx, the
which stands Chartres (the Holy place of the power of transmission, emblem of universal
Guardians of the Stone). It was the land that being.
the Gauls consecrated to Belisame (Belisa,
Belsa, Biausa, Beauce), consort ofBelen the
Ram, God of the Spring Equinox.
u'lr-i
Beauce was the land of sacred stones, The most sacred object within the temple of
menhirs and dolmens; it was the land that ancient E$/pt, it is a conical stone symbolizing
brought forth Gargantua, Son of the Giant the primeval mound that emerged from
Stone, who was the great mover of stones. See primordial waters at the creation of the
also Chartres; Rabelais. universe. See also Herm; prima Materia.

Becher, fohann foachim u:11i11

(l ,u':'! ol:?::, :l:11-T1 i1"? _!l!l)
:y?u :u?:) The first Gothic individual. as opposed to
Born in the New Agers, paradise, the collective, monk, Bernard was a very
Palatinate, Becher was an intelligent economist withdrawn man of the Benedictine order, who
and physician: in the first instance, advising set the fashion for individual salvation via a
Leopold I in Austria, in the second, the German personal meditation, a transformational
Court at Mainz. But he was an unintelligent spiritual alchemy.
alchemist; he tried ro turn the sands of the Born north of Dijon, Bernard was sent for
Danube into gold. His failure to achieve this military training but preferred to cope I,vith the
incurred courtly displeasure in Austria, so he temptations of adolescence on his own. He had
fled to Holland, then to England, where he a decidedly suggesrive vision of the Virgin
devoted himself to recording his theories on Mary, to whom he prayed, ,Show thyself a
chemistry and alchemy. He divided solids into mother'. Upon lvhich, the Virgin expressed
three kinds of earth, ol which one was ,terra several drops of milk from her breasts into
pinguis', fatty earth, the principle ol Bernard's lips.
inflammability. He equated this ,,vith Nonplussed by this, Bernard went back ro
alchemical sulphur. his military training. He later joined the monks
Becher's ideas on sulphur were later at Citeaux (the Cistercians) with his familv of
Bernard oJTra,tsa

31 in tor,v. They rvere themselves reacting to a glass-tinting and metallurgr but rvas lounded
convoluted liturgy, and wished ior the simple on mystical elements.
life of work and pra1,er, obeying the alchemical Among the lirst to write a systematic history
motto 'Laborare est Orare',. of alchemy, he linked the Egyptian,
It certainly lvasn't easy. Bernard and family Alexandrine and Syriac traditions with
r,vere in an ambience of monastic malnutrition, Gnosticism and Magic.
disease and death. Nonetheless, Bernard He made the Alexandrian alchemists
doubled the numbers ol the monastery and accessible, Zosimos, Synesius, Olympiodoros,
revived it as a Hermetic paradise. Then he left Stephanos er a/.
to found a daughter abbey in Paris, and moved To Berthelot's Collection des Anciens
on to Clairvaux, where his fame among Alchimistes Gr€cs A.E. \,Vaite olves much, as
spiritual alchemists desiring transcendence does the slow stream ol twentieth-century
bordered on the 1egendary. philosophers ol alchemy, through Waite.
Some say that Bernard masterminded the Berthelot's amassed rvorks consist ol: Zes
Knights Templar in their crusade for the Grail Origlnes de L'Alchimie (Steinheil, Paris, 1B85),
and that it was he rvho instigated the Gothic Collection des Anc[ens Alchimistes Grecs 3 vols
style of architecture together with Abbot Suger, (Steinhell, Paris, 1888) andLa Chimie au
the great cathedral-builder ol St Denis (< Moyen Age 3 vols (lmprimerie Nationale, Paris,
Dionr\rsiu5) in Paris. 1 893).

Bernard of Trevisa Bible

ib l?lllbll li ':o-?''^!"?) Of all the sacred books that alchemists claimed
An obsessional seeker of the Stone, this labled as rheir source, the Bible is the most used,
alchemist spent his whole liie pounding around misused and abused in the holy work that
the world in pursuit ol the Stone, with short alchemy stood for. Could it be just coincidence
breaks between each foray. All is recounted in that so many alchemists had been brought up
the supposedly autobiographical De Chemico on one end of the Bible or the other?
Miraculo. The whole gamut ol holy men have played
on the alchemical stage: monks, lriars, rabbis,
Berthelot, Marcelin,, t B2T -t 9oT\ cabalists, popes, abbots, saints and prophets.
At the fervish end rvere Phi1o, lsaac ol
A chemical synthesist and Prolessor ol Organic Kairouan, Maimonides, Avecebron, Farragut,
Chemistry at the Ecole Sup6rieure de Pharmacie Moses de Leon and many others. Among those
and then at the Colldge de France, Berthelot trained in holiness at the Christian end r,vere
was one ol the great nineteenth-century Bernard ol Clairvaux, lohn ol Sa1isbury, Abbot
compilers and interpreters ol alchemical texts Trithemius, Bishops Grosseteste and
through the ages. The assiduous Berthelot lvas Gundisalvus, Gerard of Cremona, St Thomas
the first modern French scholar to rescue Aquinas, Burton, Kircher, Bruno and Ripley the
alchemy lrom the disrepute into which it had Canon ol Bridllngton. Famous among lhe
la11en during the eighteenth centur)r, as science labled readers oi Holy Writ are Basil Valentine,
had advanced. Arnold Villanova and Abraham the leu,
Berthelot weighed up the evidence ol the (celebrated by Flamel). Even lsaac Newton set
early Byzantine and Alexandrian alchemical off to Cambridge lirst to become a clergrman.
papyri, made a huge index of them, translated Every permutation of Bible or breakarvay
them into French and presented his thesis that Bible has been pored over and quoted in the
alchemy \,vas not just lraudulent practices in invocations of alchem1,, lrom the earliest

24
 Black Madonna --/ -.-_ ))

€ | -'--
Alexandrine papyri (from which comes the
unknor,vn experimenter, who n ould include his
meaning of ,Bible', , biblios', ,little books,, ,the
own name among those reno$rned and indeed
inner bark of, papyrus,), the Torah, the
r'vould make up titles ol his own purported
Hexapla, the Vulgate, the Syriac peshitta, the
rvorks, as did the alchemist Michael
King lames's Bible, through ro rhe $rondrous
Sendivogius, alias Helvetius. A truly
1669 London polyglot, edited by Brian \Valton.
monumental bibliography of alchemy is that ol
Since most alchemists r,yere lorced
J.Ferguson.
underground, and most alchemists rvere
unorthodox an) ,vay, so was their bible. put the
Bibliotheca Chemica Curiosa (The
lid on rellgion and it lvill squeeze out sidewavs.
So did the alchemists, holy sourcebooks, the l::"J,: :: qy,:::' |!" * t::: ::!,: ry)
:
Plmcrnder, the Old Testamenr midrashim, the
One ol hall a dozen monuments to alchemical
Zohar, anything from targums to tosh. Even Iiterature, collected in two lat folio rzolumes
the Zohar became respectable in the face
of through the energies of its editor,
some of the bibles: the grimoires, Chaldean Jeanjacques
Manget. For other famous pillars of editorshlp
Oracles and books of spells.
see Berthelot, Ferguson,
lennls, Waite, Westcott
Of all the holy sourcebooks. the most
and Zetner. See also Ashmolean Collection
persuasirre were the pimander, the Zohar.
the
apocryphal Book ol Enoch (flor angel magic),
the Book ol Kings (for the Temple of Solomon
uirh
and the Ark), the Book of Genesis and St
lohn,s Tin, in the alchemical Kabbalah.
Gospel (for the creation of man, cosmology,
the
nature of earth and the holy Tetragrammaton
or \,Vord ol God). _ul1:k
rid":T
To placate the inquisitorial prelates, manv a
The Black Madonna is associated rvith three
monkl"v alchemist dedicated his or,l,n tvritings
Goddesses: Isis, the Egyptian goddess of
to a pope or promoter ol orthodoxl,. Thus
fertility; Mary, X,Iother olChrist; and Diana, the
Reuchlin dedicated his De Arte Cabalistica to
virgln Roman goddess. She represents the
Pope Leo X in 1 5 1 Z. It concentrates not onlv
on unpurilied tirgin, rhe feminine principle awaits
the holy four-letter word (;.,tlii bur
Jahveh), the Nigredo (the purifying of the earth, of the
rhe hoiy live lerrer r,r'ord
,iltU;.1. Jesu). lhich 'Kemi'or'al-chemy,).
is the unutterable lour,letter name olGod made
The Black Madonna r,vas linked with Isis
utterable rviLh rhe sounded .U .
1.sh.) added. well belore any Christian connotations rvith the
This book on cabalistic contrivings became the
Virgin Mary. Statues existed in underground
bible ol- Chrisrian alchemisrs.
crypts in Gaul belore the Romans. Isis rvas
The commonest biblical symbols used bv
knorvn as 'virgo paritura,, the virgin-about_to-
alchemists are: the Grail, the Ark or the Challce;
give-birrh, the virgin earrh belore its
the Temple of Solomon; the Cross: the Three
lecundation by the Sun. There are various
X,{agi; the lour Archangels; the holy four_letrer
stone monuments altesting this: one at Die
word; the Tetragrammaton. See also A4idrash;
(near Grenoble, in France) is inscribed ,Matri
Pimander; Targums; Zohar.
deum, magnae ideae'. So Isis rvas the Mother
of rhe Gods. too.
ullll:g1"phl:: In alchemical slmbolism, the Black
tr,tadonna was the virgin earth, lirst matter of
The art ol compiling bibliographies. Many of
the crear Work, friable black brittle substance
the earll alchem ical bi bl iograph ies,u.r. pu r.
that comes in mineral srate from the ore-
invention, giving an air of authoritv to an
bearing strata beneath the rocks.
 Blood

ik So the statues, personified hieroglyphs of blood ol a sick person has the eifect of
this mineral, have its black colour, and their 'drawing off the bad', as the modern alchemist
dwelling-places are the underground crypts of Tack Glass terms it.
temples.
Interestingly, there is a Black Madonna at
the shrlne oi Einsiedeln in Switzerland, _u:1Pli"1b*'v
birthplace ol the alchemist Paracelsus, as well
of the libraries orvned or visited during the
as two Black Madonnas at the Druidical site of
Renaissance by famous alchemists, the most
Chartres. In .[elenia G6ra, Poland, pilgrims still
famous belonged to Trithemius of Spanheim,
flock to the Monastery to pay homage to the
Nicholas of Cusa, f ohn Dee and Sir Thomas
Byzantine-like Black Madonna and Child on the
Bodley.
Feast ol the Virgin Mary (15 August). There are
In 1556 Duke Humphrey's 1ibrary at oxford
probably no more than a dozen Christianized
suffered no less than those ol other learned
Black Madonnas now left in Europe, although
men, lor in that year an Act against
there is a statuette of Isis at the Cathedral ol St
Superstitious Books and Images was passed.
Etienne at Metz, and a Black Aphrodite on
Down with books on Daemonolog,, Magic,
Cyprus.
Alchemy, Wltches and Heresies so thirsted after
b1, Renaissance manl No wonder.|ohn Dee's
1ibrary at Mortlake was burned down and that
:P:d Duke Humphrey's library remained 'a great
Associated with primordial sea, from which lile desolate room' for over 40 years after the Act,
evolved 3.2 billion years ago, blood is the until Sir Thomas Bodley, scholar and
universal liquid conveyor-belt of 1ife, its fluidity philanthropist, used his great influence to
representing the sacrifical blood of the Lamb of refurbish the Room in 1602 and line its wal1s
God. In the Grail legend, Christ's blood was with books of learning lor the generai public.
collected in the Grail cup, which had been Catholic in his taste, he acquired books from all
carved lrom the gem that had dropped out of disciplines: philosophy, religion and science,
the crown of Lucifer rvhen he fe1l from grace. the classics, mathematics, music, alchemy.
Alchemically, its red colour symbolizes go1d, From that time on the Bodleian Library has
whose planet is the sun. The heart is the sun of alr,vays been international in character. Bodley
the body, and the bloodstream, like the sun's himsell, brilliant, restless, Fellow of Merton
radiation in the solar system, extends to its Co11ege, oxford, was widely-travelled and had
every part. lived in Geneva and The Hague. He was
The bloodstream is the diffuser of central proficient in French, Spanish and ltalian as
eners/ to all the organs. Through its renewable rve11 as ancient Greek and Hebrew. He snapped
properties, blood is the transformer of man. up books in ancient Chinese, Syriac (the
Depending on the proportions of the language ol alchemy, intermediary between
different hormones borne in suspension in the Greek and Arabic), Turkish, Arabic and Persian,
bloodstream, man is what he is. The average even though he could lind nobody
composition of a person's bloodstream contemporary to translate them. He was
determines his more permanent tendencies. convinced that 'in processe of time, by the
And yet man affects these natural tendencies; extraordinaire diligence of some one or other
he can temper them through meditation and student they may be readily understoode'.
contemplation, which slows them down, or Bodley's imaginative librarian, Thomas
through anger and nervousness, which speeds lames, published the lirst Library Catalogue in
them up. 1605. Thereafter, the Library's reputation grew
An alchemically made bloodstone from the rapidly, and between 1620 and 1640 there

26
 Boehme, /crkob

were 350 overseas readers registered rvisdom. This body disperses in air on death. 1t
alchemists, philosophers and mathematicians is the subtle body. To the eternal body belongs
lrom all over the Mediterranean. the striving for the knowledge ol God, and on
As a splendid encouragement to a1l authors death this body rises ro cod.
and editors, Bodley had struck an agreement in
1610 with the Stationers' Company to receive a
free copy of'All new Books and Copies never '--?:h.^:., ! ?.k ! r,
? ! ? . l??1)
printed belore'. A contemplative cobbler from Gorlitz, Silesia,
Boehme uplilted his Christotheosophical light
U:1I over the Lutheran backwash. He did not claim
to be a practisin.q alchemist or deline the
In practical alchemy the body represents matter physical properries ol the 'dark disesteemed
that 'has to be separated by pounding, roasring stone ofgrey colour'. Yet, although he had it
and fire', as the alchemist Edward Kelley says. 'not in the praxis', he wrote 'in the knowledge
In metaphysical alchemy, rhe body parallels of the spirit' about the Srone and the Word:
Salt, or rhe third constituent in the alchemical
triad: Mercury, Sulphur, Salt. Theosophical emblem

In the transmuting or ralsing of vibrations, on the Soul, alter lakob

Boehme.
the body is purified of dross and raised to a
higher 1evel. It is not just a haphazard
adjustmenl in the laboratory, but an entire
change: 'a body rvith raised ideals,' says Jack
Glass in his practical workshops.
Philosophically, every metal is made up ol
Salt with Sulphur and Mercury, but in different
proportions. Only gold has equal proportions of
Sa1t, Sulphur and Mercury. A11 other metals are
out of balance because they are imperflecr. Of
the many allegorical references to the ,body' in
alchemical literature, the most curious are by
Paracelsus. ln his Astronomia l"\agna,
Paracelsus talks of three schools where man
should send his three bodies:

He should send the elemental or material

body to the elemental school, the sidereal or
ethereal body to the sidereal school, the
eternal or luminous body to the school of
eternity. For rhree lights burn in man, and
accordingly three doctrines are prescribed to
him. Only all three together make man
perfect.

Each body has attributes according to its

nature. To the phl,sical bodv, Paracelsus
ascribes 1uxury, lewdness and animal instincts.
On death, this body returns to water and earth.
To the sidereal body belong fleeling, arr and
 Boethius. An[c[us

the Word was the only noble spiritual u:g:*1f-

Philosopher's Stone, Christ. This Teutonic Titan
covered every mystical aspect of alchemy: One of the Gnostic groups driven out of
'Alchem1, in the cosmos: its First Matter and its Byzantium by the Roman Emperor Tertullian,
Three Principles, Alchemical r,vork in Man: the champion ol orthodoxy, in the second century
threelold 1lfe ln him, The Eternal Essence and ,lo, and attacked by various bishops for their
the Tincture in Man and Nature.' heresies, they gradually settled in the Balkans,
His Aurora (1610) was indeed a dawning in where they practised alchemy and spread the
the seventeenth century. 'A jewel in the r,vord ol the Gnostic alchemists Zosimos of
brummagem setting ol Relormation rubbish,' Panopolis and Stephanos of Alexandria.
Waite called it. Boehme looked with the eye ol
Time into the Eye ol Eternitr'. u:l:':i
The melting-pot of Renaissance alchemy,
The Eye of the God, Hermeticism and Rosicrucianism. What could
alter a woodcut from
not happen in Protestant England could
Horapollo's
Hierogfuphica.
happen here. The end ol the sixteenth century
was the heyday ol the HaPsburgs, and
Bohemia was their playground. This was the
meeting place ol east and west Europe:
decadent, degenerate, ful1 oi seething changes
and gullible gallivants, epitomlzed in Rudolph
II ol Bohemia (and Hungary, Austria and the
Holy Roman Empire, though not all at once). It
had courtslul ol contemporary drop-outs,
printing houses (underground or otherwise),
secret societies. brotherhoods, Mannerist artists
and alchemists; in lact all the paradoxes ol
Boe:hiuts: A*1r: li:3 ?:??n) power and pretentiousness. See also Family ol
Love; Palatinate; RudolPh ll.
Walter Lang, in his introduction to Le Mystire
des Cathddrales by Fu1cane11i, denies that there Bombastus
were any Roman alchemists:
Long thought to be Paracelsus's self-mocking
Greece stood to Rome as parents to
nickname, this is actually a corruption, stl11
offspring, and Rome proved to be a
tongue-in-cheek no doubt, of Baumast, his
delinquent child and a degenerate adult in
father's patronymic.
the community of human cultures. The plant
of alchemy flowered only briefly in Greece
and the seeds that blerv to Rome nerzer
*dn^
'??7:
germinated at ali.
This German translator added a curious
contribution to the text ol Fludd's TractGtus
This overlooks one of the greatest transmitters Apologetlcus in 1782 on the subiect ol
ol Greek wisdom to the Middle Ages: Anicius Palingenesis, the art ol recreating or rer,'iving
Boethius, the Roman philosopher and spiritual
dead things:
alchemist. Francis Bacon tells us that Boethius
\,vas the first to make the West acquainted with Palingenesis had been discovered and made
Aristotle. knor,vn by the naturalist Buoss in Aura. It is

28
 Brahe, Tycho

explained that by means of a magnetic

thenceforth.
electrum the rays of the sun and moon are
Already a child scholar in Greek, Latin,
drawn out of a viscous water and thus it Philosophy and Science, by his forties he was
becomes crystalline. There is nothing added, adding Hebrew and Aramaic, and starting
but in the space of four rveeks, wonderful missionary projects in China.
starry flowers grow up herein. These flowers From 1654, in Oxford, Boyle parrook in
can be resolved again into water by a little secret experimental workshops, ol the sort
aqua de nubibus and can be passed through inspired by Francis Bacon and maintained in
blotting paper. Bur in the space of another exile by Samuel Hartlib, lohn Dury and
lour weeks the flor,vers will be produced Comenius, Utopian refugees. These workshops
once more, reassuming their former shapes. developed into 'our invisible College', as Boyle
When the sun shines they diffuse such a describes in various letters, and appeared to be
radiance that the eye cannot support itl associated with the Rosicrucians and
Freemasons, the work undertaken there being
Booz adds that an experiment ol this kind took more akin to philosophical alchemy than just
place on 2B May lTT6belore many noble
laboratory chemistry. The meetings were
pers0ns.
conducted by lohn Wilkins in his rooms at
Wadham College, Oxford, and lrom these
BitltY:r (:?Bz-t meetings the Royal Society arose. When Boyle
: lohTi lTd:i:h T :?) was invited in 1680 to be president, he
In 1710, this alchemist invented Dresden china declined as he disagreed rvith the induction
lrom the rich Saxon clay on the banks ol the method.
Elbe, as a distraction from his search for gold.

Brahe, Tycho (b. 14 December 1546,

Boyle, Robert (b. 25 lanuary 162T,Ireland; o-],"y?,
I li iTtTl:: 111: :::g:tl -?:lT:trr 1' ?: 'u?l iilglll
A cranky, costume-obsessed, noseless
Not only rvas Boyle the first chemist to collect a astronomer-alchemist, caught up in the r,veird
gas, to prepare phosphorus (from urine) and to
world of Rudolph II and his minions, Maier and
discover that sound could not be heard across a Kepler. Tycho was entangled in the trappings ol
vacuum, he also initiated a practical alchemy, occultist courts, from Frederick II's in Denmark
based on reporting and logging a1l experiments. to those ofRudolph II and peter Vok in
He believed in the transmutation of gold, Bohemia, where, it is told, he partook ola last
and helped to persuade the Government to latal banquet and his bladder burstl
repeal the law against manufacturing gold. He
Occurrences in the heavens over his liletime
felt they should take advanrage of any gold, gave cause for Tycho to alter his path quite
horvever it rvas made. radically. The lirst heavenly event was an
In 1661 Boyle published The Sceptical eclipse olthe sun in 1560, rvhich prompted the
Chemist, which examines the great mystique of fourteen-year-old Tycho at Copenhagen
the four elements and postulates that elements University to chan.qe his studies from politics to
are marerial subsrances able to be identilied by Astronomy and Mathematics.
experiment. Further, compound elements could In 1563 Tycho observed a conjunction of
be obtained by combining simple ones. Saturn and lupiter, but realized it was a month
Boyle had become devoutly religlous in his awry according to the Allonsine Tables in
twenties. This seems to have been prompted in current use. So he started to prepare new tables
his youth by a violent thunderstorm that made lvith new instruments. He whittled away a lew
him cower in lear and vor,v godliness years dabbling in alchemy and casting
 Brahe, Tycho

the king, who rather hoped that Tycho had

discovered the art oi creating gold out of base
metals, not iust a star out of a black sky.
The comet of 1577 proved to Tycho that this
object r'vas also lurther arvay than the moon,
r,vith a very odd orbit, out of harmony with the
re.qular circuits of the planets. He tried to
compromise in his theory that all the planets
except the Earth revolved about the sun, but
that the sun itself, with satellite planets,
revolved about the Earth. Apart from these
half-hearted theories, Tycho had gimlet
eyesight, even sharper than the ancient
Ptolemy's, and he corrected al1 the previously
charted stars and planetary tables ol motion.
Tycho's observatory at Ven was finished in
1580, by which time he had set himself up as
somethlng ol an alchemist-cum-scryer,
complete with crysta1 ball 1.5 metres (5ft)in
diameter. He was visited by the rich and the
odd, including James V1 ol Scotland (1ater I ol
T-vcho Brahe, urith rin
nose (recently atiested)
England) in 1590 when James came to

horoscopes. He began to acquire a reputation

as an astrologer. This 'phoenix of astronomy' Eichstadt's Eph€nrcr[dum istettifl, 1 639) showing
eclipses. Eichstadt had worked jn Brahe's observatory,
studied sunspots, and in 1564, aged eighteen,
the Uraniborg, on the island ofVen.
had designed a huge solar mirror able to help
make alloys ol precious stones. His patron, the
King ol Denmark, Frederick II, lashed out on a
fantasy ol an observatory at Ven (an island
between Denmark and Sweden) lor Tycho to
persuade him not to emigrate to the German
states where astronomy \,vas actively
sponsored.
1\ 1572 Tycho, the last of the naked-eye
astronomers, sited an exploding star to the
north-\,vest of Cassiopoeia, and wrote about his
findings in a S2-page pamphlet, De Nova
Stella. He struck a blow to the faithful
lollowers of Aristotle who still believed in the
flxed heavens be;rond the sphere of the moon.
Tycho had actually predicted the appearance of
this nova out olthe black sky, and 1o and
behold, to the amazement of the gathered
stargazers, it did appear from its pin-prick to
burst lorth and shine brighter than Venus for
over a year. Not least impressed rvas Frederick

30
 Bruno, Giordano
ffi=)
,_Ytr,
Denmark to marry a Danish princess.
lames esoteric training of, the mind. The very
:,b,
had a superstitious appetite lor horoscopes and
expression 'to conjure up images' holds neither
the occult even though he pretended to
the force nor fear for us as it did for orthodox
denounce this inhis Daemonologie.
sixteenth-century monks. Bruno found that his
Treated like a prince in his ivory tower until
ideas on memory, and his overturning of
Frederick's death in 158g, Tycho rvas booted accepted religious opinions on God, Adam,
out, court-dress, tin nose and all, by the next
Christ and the Trinity, had gone too far for his
monarch, Christian IV, who had a temper to
Order, so he sped around Europe for support of
match Tycho's own. Into the morass of mid_
his memory system, De Umbris (Shadows).
Europe went Tycho, hi.iacked by Hajek, Imperial
In fact, his memory wheel and system of
Physician to Rudolph II, to settle in the crazv
power-incantations has much in common with
courts of Bohemia and become Imperial
the alchemists Ramon Lull, Cornelius Agrippa
Astronomer. He linally handed over his
and Trithemius. He envisages a form of
instruments and his planetary data, lock, stock
spiritual alchemy rvhereby everything in the
and barrel, to his crippled visionary successor,
unit erse - stars, planets, creatures _ can be
Kepler, in 1601. Sadly, Tycho,s painstakingly
transformed by association with other beings
made equipment was never used again. \,Vithin
in the imagination on a transcending ladder,
a few years Galileo's telescope made it all
with the star-worlds as intermediaries. His
obsolete, and it was destroyed in the fires of
interpretation is more Hermetic than Christian,
the Thirty years' War. See also Rudolph II.
his ideas and 'shadows, are more magical
than angelic.
At Oxford, Bruno,s debates were inspired by
_u-*_1_1 9l"_1 !:": y:
i: ? .: ? ??)
the appearance of the polish prince, Albrecht
Il Nolano of Brecht's The Heretic's Coqt, Bruno Laski, who was visiting Queen Elizabeth I.
was the philosopher who refused to recant, so
Bruno derided the ,idiotic showing' of the
was burned at the stake by his lellows in 1600.
University 'pedants', although he got on well
Like his spiritual master, Nicholas of Cusa, he
with Sir Philip Sidney and chivalric Elizabethan
preached that space rvas infinite and the
Earth poetry. Sidney, moreover, was receptive to
moved around the sun, in a universe in which
Bruno's magical mnemonics and allowed
man was a part equal to other parts. Unlike the
Bruno's disciple, Dicson, ro attend him.
canny Cusa or Galileo, Bruno did not escape
Eventually, Bruno ended up in Bohemia,
punishment, for he refused to eat humble pie
having 'done' the alchemical circuit. He
.t and poured scorn on the Establishment. In the
dedicated a book to Rudolph II and met
7 Dominican monastery where he trained, alter
Michael Maier, who incorporated into his own
the University of Naples, he imbibed the
books some of Bruno,s imagery that was
Dominican system of memorizing.
alchemical, particularly the images of ,Chymia,
This was not merely a way to improve one,s
the all-wise Hermes, King of Erypt,.
memory in an age where very little was written
Finally inquisition spies caught up with
down, nor simply memory-jogging exercises by
Bruno. The HapsburgJesuit alliance persecuted
recalling pictures in the mind; for Bruno it wa;
the Rosicrucians and Hermetic alchemists in
more a way of recreating worlds in the mind,
whatever country they could. Bruno was lured
through the power of the imaginatlon that was
to Venice by one Zuan Mocenigo, ,who wished',
so vivid that the imagination took on a life
of said Bruno at his Inquisirion, ,that I should
its own, and the images took on talismanic
teach him the art of memory,. Once in Venice,
powers that could influence the real world.
Btuno was handed over by that ]udas to the
Today it is lairly easy ro recognize all this as
Inquisitors, and after a seven-year trial was
'guided visualization' and other forms
of burned at the stake for his heresies about
 Buch zu Disttllieren

shador,vs of ideas, hls interpretations

ol images .[onson's masque on the Rosicrucians, lne
in the mind. Had.[ung been alive then, he Fortunqte Isles.
rvould have welcomed Bruno. Imagine Jung
being burned at the stakel See also Inquisition;
Byzantine Alchemy
Nicholas of Cusa; papyrus; Stake.
Essentially Greek alchem;,.alrer it decamped
Buch zu Distillieren lromAlexandria to Byzantium (Constantinople)
in Asia Minor in 292eo, lollowing the Decree of
A sober, constructive book, by Hieronymus Diocletian. So Byzantium was the stepping-
Brunschwick, lvhich puts alchemical processes stone bet,,veen Alexandria (Greek alchemy) and
to use, rising out ol the chaotic mass ol Baghdad (Arabian alchenrl,)',vhere persecuted
writings of the medieval alchemists searching 'alternatives' like magic, Gnosticism and
for magical elixirs. It is a kind olearly herbal, alchemy conrinued. The most lamous
printed at Strasburg in 15 1 9 by .[ohann Blzzantine alchemists [,ere Enneas ol Gaza,
Gninlnger in 330 lolio sheets ol double- Stephanos olAlexandria, Zosimos, Ostanes,
columned Gothic print, bound in pigskin, richly Olympiodoros, Peiagius, Synesius and
tooled, with brass bosses and clasps. The Heliodoros. 'Byzantine' is often used
recipes and remedies are precise and practical. synonymouslr, u,ith'Alexandrine' or'Greek',
For instance, to prepare a remedy for the palsy but strictly is later than Alexandrine. See also
r,vhich is not costly: Copts; Nestorians; Syriac; Zosimos.
Take ol parslel,seed, six lors;
ol wormrvood that is green, two good
handluls;
of distilled u,ine, six lors;
pound it all together, and distil ir in an
alembic or in an ordinary Rosenhut, as
shown here.
And of water, drink ii [i.e. ruro] spoonluls
every morning. lasring.
Rub rhe limbs nirh ir everv morning. noon
and night, and let ir dry in.

Burton, Robert 9577-1640\

This clerical recluse of Christ Church, Oxlord,

was an armchair knight-errant. He hoarded
into his Anatomy oJMelancho/y a lifetime of
firmly opinionated lact and liction. By
ingenious means, Burton collected man),
Rosicrucian and alchemical books, including
Vaughan's Golden Fleece, Boccalini,s Ragguagli
di Parnaso, the Rosea Crtu F.R.C. Fqma e
Robert Burton. u,ho said: 'The stars do incline but not
Scanzia redtry b[svati oi 1618 and Ben compeat.'
 Some say that the Cabiri u,ere the Great Gods,
and numbered eight brothers altogther.
Apparently, seven of these eighr Cabiri, sons of
Sydyk, set dor,vn their memoirs; then rheir eighth
brother.4sclepius (or Esmuu 'The Eighth,) did so
tu too, as the God Taautus (or Thorh, Hermes)
:7b commanded him. Thus was the origin of the
The 'Secret Tradition,, one of the esoreric paths lamed alchemical-Hermetlc text known as the
closel,v associated u,ith alchem1,. There are three
Esclepius. See also Esclepius; Hermes; Thoth.
sources of cabala: the Talmud; Geonic
mysticism of the exiled Iews in Babylonia; and
Arabic Neoplatonlsm (i.e. plato as inrerpreted
b1, his great disciples, panicuiarly the Arabians
ofBaghdad and Spain).
'Cabala', spelt in the Spanish way, is an
example of the cunning punning in $,hlch
alchemy abounds. By the Middle Ages, cabala
involrred the Brotherhood of Knights, the
Cabalerie, Chivalry, the Knights Templar.
Horsemen ol the 'Cavale' (secret r,visdom) were
also Horsemen ol the .Cabale' (the Knight's
srvord that tests the Stone, as King Arthur's
did). See also Kabbalah; Qabalah.

'1bilTll: :lg,'
lust as alchemy has its signs lor the basic
-
,VN U/Y YH)
elements sulphur, quicksihrer, fire, rvater and
so on so it also has its metaphysical
equivalents: philosophic I[ercury, Salt. Gold.
Moreover, a rvhole array ol secret languages
Cabalistic signs:
and magic signs exist alongside and overlap
1 Diagram of the u'orld formed fiom
the alchemical cabalistic borders.
a^
O6
initial letters of any given
sephirotic sequence.

,$ N
,?bi:: 2 Aieph, the firsr letter ol the
alphabet, spiritual root ol all
'Theurgic priests of lires not a very harmony.
- 3 Text on scroll found near the Dead
enlightening delinirion for this caste of,sacred
Sea shor,ving magical signs of a
smiths' associated rvith metal-rvorking and Ie\vish sect (firsr cenrur), AD)
digging fbr alchemical gold deep in the mines similar to mediei,al diagrams.
ol the Aegean Isle ol Samothrace, r,there |ason 4 Cabalistic scripr with rounded-off
end strokes.
and the Argonauts, {vthagoras and Orpheus,
5 llagical siqn trom Cornelrus
rvere initiated into the Greek mysteries. The Agrippa s Occulta philosophta.
secrets of these underground dr,varf_gods seem
to have passed through Alexandria and
Bvzantium ro the Arabs. thence tvest via Spain,
.t Fi Erra
6 Modern Cambodlan script, rvhich,
along itith olher Asiaric scrjpLS.
shours the same characteristics as
cabalistic alphabers of
the babbleground ol alchemy, old and nerv.
strengthened end roundels.

33
,ffi, Caduceus

sprouted in Greek times show the volatility and

:11"::*: bisexuality of Mercury, spanning the male-
The symbol olMercury, the caduceus, is two female worlds that have to be sublimated in the
serpents entwined around a central rod.ln De alchemical processes towards the unity. See
ReMetallica (Basel, 1556) Agricola describes also Hermaphrodite; Hermes; Mercury;
how: Uroboros.
The ancienrs, by means of the divining-rod,
not only procured those things necessary for Cagliostro, Count Alessandro of
a livelihood or for luxury, but they were also
t:i.:'--??)
able to alter the forms of things by it; as
when the maglcians changed the rods of the An eighteenth-century megalomaniac conman
Egzptians into serpents as the writings of in the showbiz of alchemy. Giuseppe Balsamo
the Hebrews relate; and as in Homer,
Marie Antoinette,
Minerva with a divining-rod turned the aged
Queen of France, rvife
Ulysses suddenly into a youth, and then of Louis XVI, en route
restored him back again into old age; Circe, to the guillorine in
also changed Ulysses' companions into 1793, as predicted by
Cagliostro.
beasts, but afterward gave them back again
their human form; moreover by his rod,
which was ca11ed 'Caduceus', Mercury gave
sleep to watchmen and awoke slumberers.

De Re Metallica, Agricola (Base1, 1556) ;

This rod, as a symbol ol transforming alchem- 1r

izing power, has been depicted at least as far

back as 260Obc when it is engraved on the sac-
rificial cup to King Gudea of Lagash, Sumeria.
It is found in India on srone tablets, in Egupt
and in Mesopotamia.
Under the ancient Greeks, the caduceus
became a very sophisticated instrument in the
hands of Mercury (Hermes). According to
legend, Mercury, the messenger of the Gods,
intervened in a fight between two serpents who
then curled themselves round his wand. Hence
the caduceus as a rod intertwined by two
serpents, bound at the base by their tails and (his real name) was educated at the convent of
lacing each other at the top, developed in Caltagirone, after which he practised medicine
alchemical symbolism as the polariry between through his powers of suggestiveness, his
the one (ma1e, the rodl and the dual (female, legendary high jinks matched by his legendary
the split serpents) that combine at each end. charm.
Parallel to this, the male represents Being, He had a flock of 'doves', as he called his
Fixed, Fire or Sulphur, Sex; while the lemale girl mediums, who answered from behind a
represents Becoming, Volatile, Water or screen questions on the occult and the
Mercury, Spirit. unknown. Caught up in the French Revolution,
Visual1y, the little wings that the caduceus Cagliostro prophesied the late of Marie
 Calx

Antoinette, and the London lottery numbers lor

1.776. He rvas interested in his image and Slllh
belonged to a masonic lodge (freemasons). In A Muslim chief civil and religious ruler. Over
alchemy he performed, according to his lans, the Islamic world durlng Europe,s Dark Ages
the Great Work many times, and in Warsaw got there have been some surprisingly eniightened
Prince Adam poniasky to finance him through caliphs, under whom alchemy has flourished.
many spectacular Operations on the N{ost noreworthy are: the Abbasid Caliph Harun
alchemlstical egg. ar-Rashid, who lounded the first hospital in
Princes and prelates lrom all over Europe Baghdad early in the ninth century; rhe
and the Middle East sang his praises. He and Abbasid Caliph Al Ma,amun of Baghdad (ruled
his beautilul rvile formed twin masonic 813-833), who founded his House of Wisdom;
'Egyprian' cults, until she finally
turned the Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim, who founded the
accuser and had her husband arrested lor House of Science in Cairo in 995; and the
charlatanism. Some say the convulsions that Umayyad Caliphs of Spain, Abd al-Rahman III
Cagliostro suffered in prison were because he (912-961) and his son Al-Hakam tI (961 976).
was epileptic rather than visionarv. SeeArabic; Baghdad; Damascus.

Allonso X's spherical

':Iitilt:i Calx astrolabe, showing
calendarium in
The first main alchemical Operation. The Powdered or calcinated metal. See also Castillian, rrarious
substance to be purilied alchemicallv in a Calcination. quadrants and zodiacal
furnace was heated and reduced to fine ci rcle.
powder, usually with a change of composition.
But gold, rvhen heated to a porvder (calx ol
gold) remained a metal, whereas lead heated
in
air converted into a yellowish_brown powder
that was not metallic (i.e. calx of lead is
actually lead oxide).
Many dilferent types of furnace were used
for calcining. The principle fuel was charcoal
although anything burnable was used: wood,
peat, dung. Gauging the temperature was
diflficult, but slorv-burning luels, such as dung,
were preferred because they could be controlled
more easily.
An early Greek tract, The Eight Tombs, with
its promise of allegorical vaults and Egzptian
initiation, turns out to be merely a complicated
manual on calcination. See also pernetv.

:11:1d11'
A form ol mobile calendar that is often
inscribed in a circular band on astrolabes and
was used by alchemists and medieval
astrologers to measure the positions of the
stars. See also Alfonso X.

zq
Campanelld, Tomnaso

camyynet\,.rommaso 16ze) knorvledge and a psychic process ol learning: it

l1.s?l is a transformational alchemizlng ol the sell,
A visionary among alchemists, along rvith r,ia the Hermetic priests rvho run the city. These
Postel and Giordano Bruno - and yet, unlike priests are themselr,es sen/ants of Hermes
those two a polirical realist, r,vho actually Trlsmegistus, the patron, ln this case, of occult
understood that black sheep Machiavelli, rvhile memory (perhaps rve ,,vould say the collective
rejecting his irreligious cast of mind. unconscious). It paraliels more the Egyptian
Campanella turned to natural theologl, lor the Heliopolis than Utopia. ln shape, it r,vould be a
basis ol a1l political po\ver; he believed that a three-dimensional mandala or a sacred stone
natural apocalypse would cleanse the world ol circle, r,l,ith the Pythagorean properties ol a
evils and institute change. His Citta del Sole sphere in sacred geometry, where everyone
(Clty of the Sun) anticipates Andreae's living rvithln the concentric circles of
r,vho r,vas
Christianopolis and other Rosicrucian Golden houses rvould be on a permanent 'high' of
Cities. When, in 1600, Campanella led a cosmic influences r'vhich they caught in the
revolution in south Italy against the Spanish vast v0rtex.
occupation there, the Establishment considered
this monk a shak1, character, with allegiances
more catholic than Catholic, so they held him
in close conlinement for the next 35 or so years
,'"illli"l !"s:l'
- a fate not uncommon among heretics. A modern practising French alchemist and
Even u,hile he u,as being captured and student of Fu1canelli, rvho writes only about
tortured in Naples, his lellorv ex-Dominican what he has experience ol in the practical
al
friar, Bruno, lvas being burned at the stake in laboratory: 'No author does more harm than he
Rome. It was during his Neopolitan castle rvho discusses alchemical operations of nhich ,l

imprisonment that Campanella rvrote his Citta he has carried out not even the simplest one.'
del Sole in about L602, a Utopia run by Ol Canselier's live contemplative, mystical
{
Hermetlc priests schooled in benevolent yet pertinent books, L'Alchimie expliquie sur les
alchemical magic. This extraordinary book Textes Classiqrzes is the most intriguing. lt not
orves much to Bruno's De Umbris and lmages, only explores rhe 'dry path' olMaier, Nicholas
which explore the subconscious and hor,v the F1ame1 and Zachaire, but that ol lesser known
mind learns and can receive higher sources of alchemists, Bernard of Trevisa and Christina ol
energ/; in modern terms to reach Sweden. He makes short shrilt of those r,l ho
enlightenment, perhaps. Campanella's City is don't rea1ly understand the alchemical process,
architecturally circular, rn ith a round Sun even Jung, no less, lvhose 'psychological
Temple at its centre (resembling a Mayan or acrobatings' he scorns.
Egyptian Sun City, or even Baghdad, designed Canseliet ruminates and grazes o\rer many
in 763 by the great Abbasid Caliph A1-Mansur). pastures, particularly the Hermetic language ol
Around its concentric rvalls are depicted alchemy: the puns, the lalse etymologies and
absolutely e\rerything known: all mathematical anagrams. In this way he explores Sr,vift's
figures, all human inventions, all animals, Gullirrer, Cervantes' Don Quixote, Rabelais'
birds, vegetation and minerals. Circling the Gargantua, al1 strange giant seekers of the
outermost u,al1s are statues of heroes. Hermetic path; curiously, all lull of tongue-in-
Obviously, this Utopia is more than just an cheek rvit. Likewise, Canseliet perorates on the
ideal city in the politico-economic sense, Iike alchemical substrata of Cabala, Cheval,
Thomas More's; or even in the Christian Chivalry, Knights-errant, Knights Templar, r,vith
spiritual sense, 1lke St Augustine's City ol God. all their punning palimpsests, subliminal yet
It appears to be both a repository of sublimel

36
 Chalcis

-'3iilb?1
,lli! iiil?- t:'.:,lilog1:11,".:
111i]
lse A distinguished philological scholar on rhe
one Throughout the Renaissance alchemy rvas
hand, but also a snappy Sr,viss protestant
critic called this, lvhile its adepts rvere called
rvho sau,it his mission to disprove the
earlv labourers. 'Laborare et orare, (work and pray)
dating of the Corpus Hermeticum. This was
the lr,as a famous alchemical molto.
body of aichemico-magical texts that up
till The text knorvn as Celestial Agricultureby
then (1614) had been thoughr to come direcr
Paulus Riccius, lohann Reuchlin,s
from Hermes Trismegistus in distant pre_
contemporary and er,vish convert to
history in E$/pr. Casaubon, the kill_jry .f

Christianity, heads the,,lrrls Cabal ls ticae

Christian, did not wanr anv Eg,ptophilia
(Basel, 15BZ), lvhich rhe fringe_cabalist
creeping into his theory that the texts r,vere
Pistorius collected .as a counterblast to the
post-Christian, so he cooked up evidence
that superstitions which the Kabbalah had
r.he Hermetrc Hymn.r were akin
to the psalms promoted in Christendom'. See also Waite.
and that man1, ideas had been borrorved from
Plato's Ttmaeus, and not vice versa.
Thus Casaubon stunned the occult world
but did nor destroy its laith in the Hermetic
'hty ltll:iTllyiTl
The unseen points on the meridians of the
Texts. At that point he had not heard of
the human body thar correspond with, but are not
recently discovered papyri from the third
the same as, the parasympathetic neryous
century BC at Esna in Upper Egypt referring
to system (nerue nodes).
Dhwty < 3 < 3 < 3 (Thorh Thrice Greatesil,
All esoteric schools recognize their
impll,ing that worshipping Hermes goes back
existence: the ancient l,/ei Chtn.g (The yellow
many centuries ec. See also Esclepius.
Emperor's Book of Medicine), modern oriental
acupuncture, ayun edic healing, alchemical
rcr\\ arts - all holistic medicine relies on the
-T:1:bo1 -Meri1 q77 responses ol the chakram.
The son of Isaac. As distasteful debunker
as his
father, but this time ol.f ohn Dee, rvhose work
he edited, or more likely edited out, in 1659. :l"l:idi::
Casaulson deemed Dee,s diaries of A flourth-century Neoplatonist who rvrote
conversations with Angels to be ,A r,vork lamed commentaries on plato's Timqeus. The
of
Darkness' (i.e. Edgar Cayce_type seances). Elizabethan magus, John Dee, otvned at least
He
appeared to think that Dee rvas in their lour copies ol the Ttmqeus wtth Chalcicltus,
clutches, as 'Fauste'tvas in the clutches Commentqries, a work that inspired
of
Mephistopheles. Nonetheless, the outraged Renaissance alchemists. Chalcidius's Latin
Casaubon said he r,vas publishing the work ,not version helped the Tlmqeus to survive in the
to satisfie curiosity, but to do good and Middle Ages. It was very popular in medieval
promore Religion'. The abridged tit.Ie libraries as it concerned rationalizing Creation,
is A True
& Fcritlgful Relation oJlahil pcsseclifor the lirst attempts at a scientilic cosmolog,.
mary
Y€ers B€tween Dr.
John Dee ancl Some Spirits.

:hlIl:
tllhol,:3, Syrian city near Aleppo; the birthplace of
Iamblichus, the fourth-cenrury
The elixir of Iile and panacea, ensuring rythagorean
alchemisr. Chalcis r,vas later the home ol St
prolongation or perpetuity of existence.
Ierome.
z-...----=S>A
-%A Chaldean

.,'i
-\L>
, \W
"-\_-:.1''

chlly.bs
'h11d:ii
A Greek synonvm fbr 'Babylonian', rvhich is Steel, after the Chalybes, workers ol iron, a
cognate rvith the Assyrian place-name ,lfuldu,, people of Pontus, on the south side of the Black
r,thich lvas part ol nor the whole of, Bab/onia Sea.
Not until Nabopolassar (c. 626ac), himsell a
Chaldean, founded the new kingdom of
ch?o:ti::wa:::
Babylonia did come ro Chaldea signi$r
Babylon. Mercury, also known as Abysmal water,
In the Book of Daniel I.4, 'Chaldean' is used Sylvery warer and Philosophical Basilisk.
to mean a caste of wise men, so the Chaldeans
came to mean an 6lite group of seers, prophets,
alchemists and astrologers, especially after the ?h?'-':-t
geographical Babylonia had been conquered by Before the word came into use in medieval
the Persians. Spain, this meant Cabala. 'Chariot' is from
Throughout the early Christian era, rhe Ezekiel's vision of going up rhe levels of
Neoplatonists Plotinus, porphyry, proclus and consciousness from footstool, to chariot, to
Iamblichus, up to Psellos in the eleventh throne and to heavenly halls. See also Arbatel;
century, all set hlgh store by the Chaldeans and Yorede Merkabah.
wrote treatises on the Chaldean Oracles and
Philosophy. Renaissance alchemists dwelt
Charles XII, King of Sweden 0682-tTtB)
particularly on the Chaldean beliei rhat the
heavens influenced the earth and rvere capable 'The Lion of the North' (reigned t69T 1T18)
ol producing strange eflects on the lower employed one General Paykul, alchemist, on
spheres ol being; and that the srars, planets, his general payroll.
elements and metals a1l interconnected with
man.
'Tly-:! l1-: ^?l !!' ?n _?,)
An English alchemist and conremporary ol
'111*ii."g:: lohn Dee and Edward Kelley, who was
The generic term for the highest esoteric mentioned in Ashmole's Thectrum Chemicum
knowledge of the Babylonian type. The Britqnnlcum. Charnockworked as a laboratory
Chaldean name 'Maghdim' meant 'supreme assistant to discover the secret ol the
wisdom', so in time the whole expression Philosopher's Srone. He once noted that he had
came to mean rhe distilled sacred knowledge repeated one alchemical Operation 476 times
of the sages of India, persia, Babylonia and and hoped to continue to the five-hundredth.
Erypt. This was in keeping with the widely-held belief
Many Greek and Byzantine alchemists that the more an alchemical Work was
believed that their philosophy started among repeated, the more refined the substance
the 'Barbarians' in E$/pt and in Babylon. became, as did the alchemist, until finally he
Democritus (c. 460 - c. 310oc) is one of, the reached perfection.
early Greek philosophers who is said to have Charnock was press-ganged into seruice in
travelled around ES/pt, Persia and the Red Sea, Queen Mary's army at Calais, but he apparently
and to have written On the Sacred Writings in wrecked his laboratory first because he was so
Babylon and A Chaldean Account some time in furious at having to leave it. He wrote a book
the fifth century BC. in verse, on alchemy, which he dedicated to
 Lord Burghley, a surreptitious alchemist and m,_
friend oflohn Dee. ll"*t:::rh::li3:
A modern study by Charles Nicholl of
alchemical themes in humanist literature
:13:i::: (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980).
Alchemically a giant goetic dolmen for spiritual
translormation (along with other Gothic Chemical wedding
cathedrals) built by the Knights Templar after
initiation by St Bernard of Clairvaux. Relationships that culminate in alchemical
The cathedral suffered 13 conflagrations in weddings are rhe stuff of the allegories of
350 years since its founding in the year 1000. alchemy! They refer (usua11y) to the joining or
It was dedicated on 8 September in that year, 'con.iuctio' of Philosophic Mercury and Sulphur
with B September being celebrated as Mary, the (purified Silver and Gold) in the linal srages of
Mother of Jesus' birthday. The great Fulbertus the Operation.
who founded the cathedral had built a cluster The most famous wedding in alchemical
of small houses and classrooms around the literature is The Chymlcctl Wedding oJChrtstian
cathedral. Three or four years after the Rosencreutz by I.V. Andreae, the Rosicrucian
dedication, at rhe annual celebration, lightning (Strasburg, 1 61 6). This seven-day dream-
struck the wooden steeple of Chaftres and journey, which the reader undertakes with
everything went up in flames, classrooms and Christian Rosencreutz, leads not only to the
a1l. See also Dolmen; Goetic. perfected alchemical wedding that he observes
but also to an alchemical bird that is created in
a laboratory.
9l1l'11: -o3 :ff*v l:? :?:li::l Some say rhar rhe wedding in the allegory
Poet, diplomat, Controller of the Customs and also celebrates the actual wedding in 1613 of
writer of The Canterbury Tales. Frederick V of the Palatinate and princess
Of Chaucer's many references to alchemists Elizabeth (daughter of James I), upon which
- Avicenna, Averroes, Galen, Rhazes and the New Agers so pinned their hopes of a
like - the most popular are the characters in marvellous merger of Rhine and Thames into a
'The Canon's Yeoman's Tale', which pulls apart Eurostream ol enlightenment. All dreams of
the grand concept of alchemy in a brilliant this great stream of consciousness were
satire. drowned in the hideous deluge of the Thirty
Years' War. See also Andreae; palatinate.

:l:'"i:il ::,,ili:ly-i
Defined by Aristotle as 'a union of seven :*i
bodies, capable of such combination involving The original life that breaks our of the depths
a transformation of the properries of the bodies of the earth, the beginning of all movement,
combined'. according to Chinese alchemy. In the I Chlng,
This definition, summing up Aristotle's chen is the trigram 'Thunder', the 'Arousing',
most important achievement and the basis of the beginning of the alchemical Great Work. On
practical alchemy, comes from Book IV of the its own, though, the beginning is not enough.
l,leteorologt, a programme of research into the In the esoteric handbook on meditation, the
nature of various substances with a view to seventeenth-century T'ai I Chin Hua Tsung
classifying them according to how they could Chih, is the warning: 'But when the practice is
or could not be acted upon. started one must press on from the obvious to
the profound, from the coarse to the fine.'

39
 ChInese a/chengt

centur)'ec, rvho \vrote two recipe books on

gold-making: The Great n'easure and The
Secr€ts oJ the Park. He \\ras a u,onder-nrorker,
esteemed by kings and nobles rvho prof-essed to
knou,rvhat occult rrlrrue should be studied in
order lor a state to prosper. Gold-making
cerrainly prospered. According to one
commentator in,ro1B0, the Emperor \,Ven in
175ec had allor,ved alchemical gold to be made,
and br, 144ec people rvere proliting by it, to the
\ plrilosopher ot rhe Tao ,\\ a\l extent that the Emperor ling (Ching) issued an
imperial edit decreeing that rhose r,l ho made
counterfeit gold should be punished by public
F
g execution. Apparentllr. nrhen these alchemical
opportunists had used Lrp all rheir means on
their experiments, they turned to robbery and
an early lorm ol hijacking or hold-up.
Alchemy r,l as obviously not eliminated
iil
during that time. ln 133sc, Li Chao Kiun, an ,;

alchemist, rvas received by Emperor Wu Ti

because he claimed rhat b),'rvorshipping the $

Goddess of the Stove he had discovered the

;{
secret of eternal lile, rvhich rvould enable the 3
s
il
emperor to hear the immortals ol Peng-lai who !L

Iived beneath the ocean. The Goddess ol the $

Stove rvas a 'beauriful old woman clad in red

garments with her hair done up ln a knot on
the top oi her head'. She was the Divinity ol

'lll::" il:h:.I Cooking and Breu,ing medicines and Alchemv.

ln some versions ol the legend she was also
Knorvn in China as the Hermetic Art ol the knorvn as the Goddess of the Furnace (Tsao), to
Celesrial Empire and dating back at ieast to the u,hom the alchemist persuades Emperor \iVu Ti
fourth century nc rvhere it is linked rvith to sacrifice:
Taoism. Chinese alchemy embodles the idea ol
'change', translormation from one thing to its ... for you sha11 have the power to summon
opposite, from Yin to Yang. Some say it dares supernatural beings. \'Vhen you have made
back to 1000ec, to the Shu Chingbookof these beings appear, cinnabar po.,vder can be
history, the oldest of the Chlnese Classics. lransmuted into yellotv gold; rvhen the
rvhich expounds the Yin-Yang doctrine of the yellow gold has been produced you can
live stages ol change. make eating and drinking utensils lrom ir.
The iirst aim of oriental alchemy r,vas to Thereafter, you shall have great longevity,
achieve longevity via the Elixir ol Life. This and ysu shall see the Blessed (hsien) ol the
was a noble aim: it could lead to immortality. Isie ol P'ong-lai, r,vhich is in the middle of
The second I'vas gold-making, a commercial the sea.
aim: this rvas despised.
In China the lirst practitioner ol alchemy is Cinnabar in the course of combustion broke
believed to have been Dzou yen ol the lourrh dorvn into mercury, rvhich sl,mbolized the

40
 Chlorophyll

mysrery of regeneration through death. Thls

number, so did the Taoist alchemists. But rheir
passion lor immortality led to untold deaths
sacred number r,vas five, r,r,hich they saw in
l:. among alchemists; many popped off after being relation to the magic square of numbers 1-9.
,.t to poisoned by'potable gold', Divine Cinnabar,
Upon this rested rhe theory ofyin and yang.
-r the Golden Elixir of long life. In about 6Oec Llu
They built up the pracrlcal system ol alchemy
Hsiang conducted experiments on immortalitv with rhe concepr ol live:
for the Emperor Suan. They were spectacular
fliascos, lor which Liu was sentenced to death, Five directions: North, South, East, \,Vest
lie. then unsentenced u,hen his brother oflered a and Centre;
:le substantial ransoml Divine Cinnab ar, qurum Five elements: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal
an potabile, appears in some texts to be a physical and Water;
: substance, ',vhereas in others, especially Taoist Five colours: yellow, Blue, Red, White
texts, it appears as a symbol of the spiritual and Black;
-l
state no longer bound by Time. A distinction Five metals: Gold, Silver, Lead, Copper
: was made benveen rhe ,tvai tan, or exoteric and Iron:
j path, and the 'nei tan' or esoteric path. Five planets: Mercury, Mars, .Jupiter,
By the second century AD experimenters in Venus and Saturn.
the alchemical art r,vere dying in multitudes,
Each of the five elements was associated with a
through imbibing quantities of this or that
certain colour, direction, metal and planet.
metal or mineral; not only cinnabar but
Thus, Earth was associared with yellow,
particularly gold and jade, which in liquid form
Centre, Gold and Saturn. Wood was associated
were said to protect the body from corruption.
lvith Blue, East, Lead and lupiter. Fire rvas
: However, \ivei Po-Yang ln a text of ,*142
associated with Red, South, Copper and Mars.
:io lvrites: 'By nature, gold is not harmful., The Metal was associated with White, West, Silver
manufacture ol gold was seen as an alchemical and Venus. Water was associated with Black,
act at a human level rather than a natural act
North, Iron and Mercury. Ultimately, there were
at a purellz mineral 1evel. To produce the five stages of change belore the alchemical goal
Philosophic Stone was considered not so much
ol immortality was reached. Gradually, over rhe
technical as procreative and the relationship centuries, Chinese alchemists spoke more open_
between man and gold was largely mystical.
ly about ascetic, contemplative techniques of
io Between the second and third centuries eo a alchemical transformation, (,nei tan,, the Inner
Ti document appeared called the Tsan_tung_chi,
tath1, and the physical universe of the labora_
concerning the 'Three Similars,: star_shaped
tory experiment ('wai tan', the Outer parh). By
hexagons, alchemy and Taoist philosophy.
the thirteenth century they mostly saw the
About the same time the greatest and most physical and the metaphysical universe as one,
colourful olalchemists flourished: Go_Hung, in matter and ener$/.
!e
known as Pao-pou Tseu or Old Sober_Sides. Ue
rescued the reputation ol alcheml, as a get_rich_
quick path, and in his,a/e9, pe-en (Treatise on :lP:!l4l
the Inner Chapters) put it in its context of
The green pigment in plants that absorbs
Taoist philosophlz: The path of the Universe.
energz from the sun. Alchemists early guessing
As Heraclitus, the early Greek philosopher in at photosynthesis, kne',v chlorophyll had
the West, based the practical principles ol something to do with lile and growrh by means
elementary chemistry on the prime element of of transforming water with ,something in the
matter, fire, so did Taoism in the East. air'.
Moreover, as the pythagoreans saw the strong
It was not until the alchemist Van Helmont
relationships between the elements and dld his experiments rvith burning rvood that
Christopher, St

this 'something' was quantified as 'gas In 1781 the statue was dragged out and
sylvestre' (gas from wood), later to be labelled hacked to pieces, but only alter its namesake
carbon dioxide. According to Occult Chemistry, Christophe de Beaumont, Archbishop of Paris
one molecule of chlorophyll looks like a (who had resisted the destruction of the
dodecahedron. Robert Lawlor ln his book on statue), rvas dead. There must have been some
Sacred Geometry draws the analogr between very powerful reason for the destruction ol so
chlorophyll and the Gothic Rose Windows. See many St Christophers. Could it be that the
also Dodecahedron; Rose Windows; Van Church knew that the saint's likeness was
Helmont. more than the symbol of the Christ-bearer?
The first meaning of Christopher comes from
Christus Offerus, 'he who carries Christ', (Greek
9l11i1ithi1 li lpustoSopos) but in cabalistic false
St Christopher has had a strange history. etymologz, phonetically, Christopher :
Statues of him in churches were repeatedly Chrysopher, 'he who carries gold' (Greek
destroyed through the centuries, as if he was XpusoSopos).
an anti-Christ instead ol a carrier of Christ. In This means that the St Christopher is the
the Chapter of Notre-Dame de Paris, there used hieroglyph for solar sulphur (]esus), lor gold
to be a great grey-painted statue of St being born(e), ralsed on the waters of mercury
Christopher against the flrst pillar on the right and carried over/transported/transfigured by
as one entered the nave. It was erected in 141'3 the energr flow ol mercury, over and up to the
by Antoine des Essarts, King Charies M's Elysian fields, the heavenly state of perfection.
Chamberlain.

:h'v::ry:li
The ancient Alexandrian cralt of metallurgz
and goldsmithy, that later became confused
with Christ and crystals and alchemical
mumbo-jumbo, as in Nicephoros' thirteenth-
century tract The Chrysopoeia oJ the egg.
Berthelot in his collection of Greek texts,
formed during the eighth or ninth century at
Constantinople, lists a lexicon ol The z'rt oJ
Chtysopoeia, in which various alchemical terms
are given chemical deiinitions: The Seed ol
Venus is verdigris; Dew is mercury extracted
from arsenic; and the Sacred Stone is
chrysolite, also known as the Hidden Mystery.
Magnesia is identified with white lead, pyrites'
crude vinegar and native sulphur of antimony
ca11ed 'female antimony'. 'The Stone which is
not a Stone' is lime and vapour sublimate
diluted with vinegar. Regeneration is the
process of calcinlng and washing.

:l'v::1
one of two brothers who, in Venetian myth,
 Cluny

were the inventors of iron and the many uses

t1ul1'
of it. Chrysor had all the attributes of vutcan,
I,lercury, and Apollo. The name ,Chrysor, Written by lakob Boehme, the Clavls or Key
involves an alchemical pun: it contains the sums up the mystical alchemist,s theosophy.
Hebrew I'i il , ,kharats' (sharpening or Written in 1624, it is a visionary work about
cutting), with 'chrysor,, the Assyrian word for the nature of God and his emanated divine
gold. power lrom which the visible world is created.
It reads like a work ol divine meditation,
refl ecting Boehme's deeply devotional lifestyle.
iIl
]K !l{'i.:h":'
The Chymic Choir oJ the Seven Metals is the first clunv
picture after the tirle page in the alchemical
compendium, lfusqeum Herme t[cum, compiled
It is said that this abbey was founded in
Burgundy in 910 by 12 Benedictine monks Cluny. Holv the nerv
by Lucas Jennis in 1625.
Gothic cathedral might
from Monte Cassino to enable complete
have iooked r,l'hen it
autonomy. After the drop ol monastic
u/as consecrated in
t1'1101' standards in the previous century, Cluny set
1 0s5.

Natural mercuric sulphide; a bright red

crystalline solid; the principal ore of mercury. A
favourite prime matter among Chinese and
Arabian alchemists, who extracted their
mercury from it. The name ,cinnabar, comes
lrom the persian, meaning ,dragon,s blood,.
See also Philosophic Mercury, Salt and
Sulphur.

Tl:1:iil:
A religious order lounded in Citeaux, France, in
1098. The Cistercians handed down the
tradition ol Sacred ceometry, the ,trair,, to the
Gothic master-builders ol cathedrals. A
fraternity of masons had been created at
Citeaux, The Children of Solomon, who were
associated with Bernard of Clairvaux's Order of
the Temple of Solomon (the complex
organization of monks, laymen, soldiers and
craftsmen).
It so happened that the two most powerful
representatives ol spiritual alchemy working
through religious insritutions, the Cluniacs and
the Cistercians, showed its trvo faces, the fair
(the Gothic), and the dark (the Crusades), in
equal measure.
't, CoagulatIon

the most abstemious example ol pacilism and Solomon the Peaceful lorged weapons lor
protection rvhich were not needed in his
sanctity, until suddenly in 1095 n'tro
extraordinary things happened there: the First day. Daruid prepared ornaments for the
crusade was launched, and the nerv Gothic Temple, although they could not be used in
Cathedral was consecrated; it rvas being built his day ... This work as I see it cannot be
according to the lalvs ol Sacred Geometry by a called useless.
guild of master craltsmen or freemasons. It is So Peter organized his team ol esoteric
thought that there u,as a flor,v of alchemical translators working benveen Cluny and centres
knorvledge bettveen C1un1, and the island on building up
ol learning in Moorish Spain,
Lake Como, rvhich rvas home to the esoteric Latin,
netrvorks ol texts in Greek, Hebrew,
brotherhood ol the Comacenes. Arabic, French and Castillian, for the vast
odo (tenth cenlury), the iirst ol the tr,vo
Cluniac Collection (knorvn as the Cluniqc
colossi among Cluniac abbots, used to
Clrpus). The Cluniac order spread far and
commute over the Alps to Como, an early wide: 1,500 monasteries ranged lrom Portugal
seeker of the Grail in the lace of the bandetti
to Poland under Abbot Hugh (1089-1 130)'
and the mercenaries, the carrier of alchemical
iorming an emPire. But somehorv a
ne\vs on the routes ol the rapers of Burgundy,
stranglehold undercurrenl had been creeping
viking, Muslim and Magrar' There were other in: the Cluniac Pope Gregory VII's crusading
raiders, other routes from Cluny, the most plans (c. 1075), then the lnquisition, lollowed
solemn being the thousand miles of pilgrimage
ultimately by the mobs ol the French
to Compostella along the alchemical silk road Revolution who wrecked the great abbey at
over the Pyrenees.
Cluny almost utterly.
The second of the colossi of C1un1', Peter the
Venerable (c. 1092-1.156), rvas a remarkable
visionary, rvho foresarv a Lu11-type art at the
c""q'l3ll:i &
JE

abbey rvhere lvluslim, lew and Christian could

The process ol alchemically clotting insoluble
harmonize their mystic philosophies (provided materials, particularly used ol Mercury in the
the Christian ideas rvere uppermost). In the process of purifying it in the Great Work.
1 13Os and 1 140s, Peter underwrote the daring
Read rvhat Eirenaeus Philalethes has to say
enterprise ol translating Muslim religious and in 'Ol the Difliculty and Length of the First
alchemical works into Latin, including the
operation', from The open Entrznce t0 the
Koran, (for which Peter financed the Closerl Palace oJ the King about the difiiculties
Englishman Robert ol Ketton), and oi alchemists had rvith mercury:
investigating the Talmud with the help ol
Jer,vish converts. Bernard of Clairvaux, his
I,{ercury emerged in a hermaphroditic state.
friend and arch-rival, did not like this at all. Then they placed it in the fire; in no long
His cousin Robert had delected to C1uny. time they succeeded in coagulating it, and
Bernard scorned its 'dainty coverlets' as in its coagulation they lound the Sun and
'comfort for the lveak', so he lvaged war the Moon in a most pure state. Then they
against Cluny and converted many monks considered that, belore its coagulation, this
there, for he was convinced he r,vas right, and Mercury was not a metai, since, on being
he had the backing olAbbot Suger, the great volatized, it left no residue at the bottom ol
cathedral-bui1der. the distilling vessell hence they cal1ed it
However, Peter the Venerable, in his unmatured gold and their living (or quick)
apology lor amassing his multi-laith silver. lt also occurred to them that if gold
manuscripts, safeguarded his orvn Christian were so\vn, as it rvere, in the soil ol its own
interests by replying to Bernard's criticism: first substance, its excellence rvould

44
 Colonna, Franc€sco

probably be enhanced, and u,hen they rvere extracted in Mesopotamia for Operations
placed gold therein, the lixed was volatized, at Haran and Edessa. The Syriac influence on
the hard softened, the coagulated dissolted, Arablc words is apparent in the u,ord for lead,
to the amazement of nature herselfl. 'abaru', which is very common in Arabic
The point here is that paradoxes are happening treatises on alchemy and whlch is the same in
alchemically. Coagulation normallyhappens to Syriac.
insoluble substances once they are heated to a
certain temperature. Having coagulated, they
cannot be dissolved by their rzery nature ol
::l-:l? Fli".::::
being 'insoluble'. A filteenth-century Dominican monk, alchemist
But here lve have coagulated Mercury being and the presumed author ofthe allegory The
dissolvedt The quotation looks like gibberish, Drea m oJ Po lyph t lus, which appeared

but as Frater Albertus says: ,As is the case l,vith anonymously in 1499, beautilully printed by
all alchemystical literature, a prolonged Aldus Manutius, founder of the Aldine press in
contemplation rvill eventually reveal its true Venice. In itself this book is a r,vork of alchemy:
meaning in the plainest manner imaginable., a threelold fusion olwriter, printer and punch-
In the traditional 12 stages of the operation, cutter.
coagulation was sometimes the term used The allegory rakes polyphilus (the Lorrer) on
instead of congelation or crystallization. an alchemical journey to the divine ,conjuncrio'
or marriage with his polia (the Beloved). The
iourney is a wonderland punctuated bv
9?hobu::ol
The process of returning a distillate to its
residue and then re-distilling, often many
hundred times, especially in a pelican or
double-headed still.
The English alchemist Thomas Charnock
carried out this process nearly 5OO times,
obsessively, as ilthis would make his
substance, his Stone, more porenti similar to Illustrations for
Colonna's
potentizing in homeopathy.
H)tpnerotomdchid (The
Dream of Pollphilus).

{lltris
Golden Fleece country, ar the East End ol the
Euxine or Black Sea, bounded on the north by architectural buiidings
the Caucasus. Famed as the destination ol rne resembling the sacred solids of
Argonauts, who sailed thither to rerrieve the Pythagoras: a square pyramid,
Golden Fleece, Colchis rvas also the home ol the an obelisk, a queen's courtyard
enchantress Medea, lvho used alchemical spells laid out as a giant chessboard,
and poisons. For centuries, Zoroastrian magic three gates, a round temple, a
rvas preserued there, as the place of initiation. seven-sided lountain, a maze,
mountains, rivers, tunnels, a
graveyard, a circular mystic
':11r,", island and a sacred rose-
The metal ore from rvhich lead and antimonv garden.
Co/ours

The characters that Polyphilus encounters Mecca. Ir is the site ol the Gothic Cathedral of
are culled irom all kinds of faerie: dragons and St .James of Compostela in northwest Spain, the
nymphs, revellers, the Queen Eleuterillida, the chief place of pilgrimage throughout the Middle
four elements, Venus, P1uto, Cupid, Queen Ages. To arrive there, .|ew, Christian and
Psyche, quite Midsttmmer Night's Dream-like. Muslim would travel on loot lor many years
Yet the story is not just Shakespeare's Dream. from all over the alchemical world: Alexandria,
It has echoes ol the medieval Roman de lct Prague, Sicily, Baghdad and Constantinople.
fiose, Dante's lryftrno, and Lervis Carroll's Hermetic and alchemical manuscripts rvould be
Through the Looking-G1ass rvith its queens and exchanged and interpreted, and initiations
giant chessboard and Jabbenvock dragon. And would take place under the sacred ogives
from Colonna's Drectm, the Rosicrucian, (vaulted arches). The art ol'envo0tement'
Andreae, took his ideas for The Chymical lvorked on the pilgrims who stood beneath
Weddi ng oJ C hrl s ti an Ra s €ncreu tz. them. Spiritual translormations happened
there. As Walter Lang says, 'God is an
alchemist'.
T9l1'
These are vital in assessing each stage ol the
Great Work. The fourth-century Zosimos writes sr lames
(Santiago) with
of the black ol prime matter through the 'white,
scallop shell.
yellow and violet stages in the successive Alter a carving
operations ol the stone'. Each stage was on the
dependent on the level ol heat, and each level Romanesque
of heat had its own colour. church at
Zamora, Spain.
These Four Degrees ol heat were standard
through the ages. There is a delightlul
illustration of them in Stolcius' Viridqrium
Chemicum ol 1624. 6

As it has a much higher vibration than

{
sound, colour has a much stronger impact on
$
the body, human or otherwise. So even finer $
*
chemical changes are brought about by colour
than by sound. In terms of healing we mostly $
know only ol ultra-violet lamps, or black-out
curtains to heal migraine, or colour lilters for
scotopic vision among certain dyslexic people.
However, to work lvith the correspondences
between body-area and colour is one ol the
most logical ways of healing. From Paracelsus
onwards through Hahnemann and Goethe,
rvith their laws of sympathies and antipathies,
homeopaths and alchemists have been
practising colour therapy until the present day.
See also Indigo.

I
,\
1'!:,:::li irr,'
;!
Santiago de Compostela is the alchemists'

46
 Constantia. Leona -^--)
-)
,, .1'

'1./ /_,
The telluric currents under the site of St
James rvere supposedly similar to those under
:?yn:1:?::i:
Chartres and other great Gothic cathedrals. Meaning 'going up in fire', this is an
They drew pilgrims west.,vards to these spots of appropriate rvord in alchemy! Chartres
earth-ener$/. These cathedrals, sanctuaries ol Cathedral suf,lered thirteen conflagrations in
the sciences, the arts, the Tradition, were giant three hundred and fifty years since its founding
alchemical vessels, whose contents or in the year 1000.
congregations underwent transformation, Many deliberate conflagrations targeted
refinement and final union with God. people and places with alchemical knowledge:
This tremendous cathedral, dedicated to the libraries, especially those of Alexandria,
Knightly Order of Santiago (St James) on the Byzantium and Toledo; observatories,
North Atlantic coast of Galicia, knorvn as especially Tycho Brahe's at Prague in the Thirry
Compostela, was founded by Sanchez the Great Years' War; cathedrals, especially Chartres and
ln celebration of the retreat of the Moors. It is Cluny; and people, especially Bruno at the
said that he enlisted the help of the cathedral stake in 1600.
masons at C1uny, one of the three brotherhoods
of master-builders known as rhe Children of
Master Jacques (i.e. James). The cult ol St James ::'-s:1i:1"_
was no doubt influenced by James the For some, not a1l, the second stage of the Great
Companion of the Lord, leading the faithful to Work (the first being Calcination, and the third
victory on his whlte horse, a sort of counterpart being Fixation). Congelation is associated with
to the Islamic.[ihad, which was still so recently Taurus the Bull. The word was often used
felt in Spain from where rhe Moors had been synonymously with Coagulation, but
expected in 1492. Congelation usually implied the opposite of
The special pilgrimage or periplus of the 'fusion'.
year was the thousand-mi1e round trip from
Cluny to Compostela, with the adept or
'compos' being guided by the 'stella', like the ::ii"::i:
magi over the desert sands with their shel1 ol An alchemical marriage; a joining, or
protection. conjunction or fusion on different levels:
The proverbial Spanish name for the Milky
1 physico-chemical, as in laboratory
Way is 'E1 Camino de Santiago' (rhe Santiago
experiments with the fusion of metals;
Road), while the cabalistic meaning of
2 emotional, as in Christian Rosy Cross when
Compostela is 'compos', the one
he is joined with his beloved (see Andreae);
master/possessor; and'ste11a' (ablative) or
3 spiritual, as when Boehme or other spiritual
'ste11ae' (genitive), of the star - i.e. ol gold, the
alchemists are in union with God;
alchemical Stone.
4 astrological, as Sun and Moon conjunction;
The shell of Compostela is also a symbol for
5 a11egorical, as the Hermaphrodite, the
mercury and placed at the entrance of shrines
Androgrne.
and certain freemasons' buildings. The greatest
legendary alchemical pilgrim along the 'path oi See also Andreae; Androgrne; Boehme.
the star' or 'campus stellae' rvas Nicholas
Flamel. He undertook the alchemist's long c3iillilil T:ii
journey, first by land, then by water. In his
Figures Hidroglyphiques he asked 'Monsieur The Abbess ol Clermont, who was received into
Jacques de Galice' for he1p, 1ight, and the Rosicrucian Order as a fully practising
protection. member and honorary Master in theyear 1,736.

47
 Cons tdnt[ne the ,lfrtcan

It so happened that the only known existing His major translation direct into Latin from the
Rosicrucian order ol 1736 came under the original Arabic rvas Rhazes' alchemical Liber
control ol the freemasons and was on the point Experlmentorum.
of ceasing to recruit women. But by 1 794 lhe Constantine was not a respecter ol other
Order was, in the words of A.E. Waite, 'just people's copyright or authorship, and took the
emerging from the alembics of the French kudos for many of the works that Hunayn had
Revolution and it broke lree lrom the either translated lrom the Greek or written
restrictions imposed on it by masonry. himself, such as his Ten Treatises on the Eye.
This turned up as Constantine's De Oculls, with
Constantine the African no acknowledgments.

ll :o?o' ! :'11: Yllll lllilill c:p-ry:i:

The most barbarous ol the Barbaro-Latin
translators of Arabian medical science, alchemy Ferrous sulphate or green vitriol; a pale green
and mathematics. crystalline soluble salt used in dying, tanning
An eleventh-century Tunisian, he roved and ink-making. dl

around the Mediterranean before becoming a

monk at the lamed monastery of Monte
Cassino in Campania, seat of the Benedictines. T-pt:
He set about transcribing as many ancient
A group of Phoenician peoples settled in north
Greek and Arabian texts into Latin as he cou1d,
Egvpt, whose language is related to Pharaonic
betrveen his arrival c. 1070 and his death in
Egrptian. The word 'copt' either derives from
1087. His Latin shorvs he has sometimes
Coptetus (< al-kibt < al-kubt [Copt]); or Copts
wildly misunderstood the original Arabic and
(< gyptios < aiguptios [Egyptian]).
equally wildl1, misconstrued his Latin
The Copts rvere early transmitters of
grammar. But at least he made a start on the
alchemy, chrysopoeia and metallurg,. They
revival ol Greek scientiiic learning in medieval
belierred in exorcisms, healing and visions of
Europe rvhere Islamic medicine and science had
saints, including St Anthony, one of the early
al1 but perished into any old abracadabra.
Coptic Desert Fathers. They r,vere famous for
Constantine translated into Latin the
praxis, manual labour and contemplation
Aphorisms ol Hippocrates from the Arabic
rather than intellectual study. But to the Copts
version ol Hunayn, the Prognostica of
is owed the preservation of the Hermetic
Hippocrates, and works by Galen and Isaac.
papyri. As intermediaries between the
Pharaonic ES/ptians and the Alexandrian
Abracadabra. A
ABRACADABRA Greeks and len,s, the Coptic scholars could
Kabbalistic charm,
apparently constructed ABR,ACADABR. decipher the ancient hieroglyphs and translate
them into Greek. According to Coptic tradition,
lrom the initials of the ABR.ACADAB the Great Pyramid was built before the Flood. It
Hebrerv rvords AB
(lathe|. BEN (son), and ABRACADA was King Surid who had it built and who
RUACH ACADASCH ABR,ACAD ordered his priests to write down their amassed
(Hol)t SPirit). Considered
ABRACA rvisdom on scrolls and conceal them under the
to be an antidote lor
ailments, the word was ABRAC Pyramid.

originalli, rvritten on ABR,A In the seventeenth century the brilliant

parchment and
ABR Jesuit, Athanasius Kircher, worked out that
suspended from the
AB ES/pt, not Greece, was the home of original
rvisdom, and that Coptic was a descendant of
neck by a linen thread
in the triangular lormat A E$/ptian hieroglyphs.

48
E UR PRINCIPLES OF THE DIVINE IN ALCHEMY
ROM FOUR DIFFERENT TRADITIONS

1 Con, the Crearor. In Kabbalistic alchemy Jahveh, rhe

.Je\\,ish Christian God, rvas
the patriarchal creator behind ar1 evolution and transformation.
The picture lvorks
clockwise lrom the top rlght, down to the primitive
sea-creatures at God,s fleet, then
round ro the left. coming up to the birds and land
animals. Artrst.. Diana Fernando
2 Ptx, rhe earll'Greek
goat eod, is the
transfbrming poi,,,cr in
nature at its mosr
primiti\rc. His t\\ro horns,
head and bodv lorm Lhe
hierogl.t,ph ol l,tercun, l
his silhoueue rhe phallic
herm.
4rtis t: Diol.Ld Fernondo
 5 rypuoN eln
OSIRIS/SOK{RIS. The
Egyprian Typhon
(madness, chaos) is the
hermaphrodite god lvho
destroyed his brother
Osiris. Here he (on rhe
left) iaces Osiris in the
undenr,orld of the Bent
Pyramid rhat keeps its
secrets unsol,,,ed.
Alchemically, Typhon
(nigredo, rhe black
shador,v-state) has to be
sublimated and
conftonted b1, u,har he
has destroyed. Osiris, rhe
':*;':
:_r -; death god, in rurn rises
,t..j . "f 'r,{5i.1 and is recreated in the
&Jlq {',;:'1'..n1 iight oi consciousness as
'', :.3tr]ir.::;'i:l' :.t
.,.. .*i:i.j..a;rlr,, Sokaris the fertilitl. god.
Arttst; Diana Fernando
 4 ttRtsHx,t,tt'lD RADHA. In Rasa)ana (lndian alchem1., lr,here ,rasa, me ans
mercur,v) the bol,ish god Krishna is gold and Raclha sih,er, rvho toin as the
hermaphrodite atier Krishna, the rrickster r,vho can transfbrm himsell into anyrhing
has led her a mern.dance. Artlst: Dtana F€rnol1do

{x}.i

"a.,,
1

:t';,f,r:4
"aj

.i:"dFl

,:,i.,J,11::. :;{:... . .,:., ;i".:gk .i:++1ir+lr :i",

 Co rne lt us Agi p pa, HenLy

Aglllli: H:-i,v
':1i:l1: \: :?:'_: ? :?)
Unlike his Master of Masters, Trithemius,
Cornelius Agrippa .,vas a ,seeker all his life and
atrained neither science nor peace'. according
to Eliphas L6vi, rhe occult magus. Bur his
devotee, Thomas \raughan, in his Anima
Mag[ca Abscondita of 1650, calls him ,the
Oracle of Magic', and the ,Master of Wierus'
(lohn Wier, studenr and Boswell to Cornelius).
In most early biographies Cornelius smacks
olblack magic. He shares with Faust ,the
odium of Satanic intimacy,. There were
rumours that Cornelius slept nightly in the
moon, that he could 'get' from Fribourg in
Switzerland after a lecture to point-a-Nousson
in France within a second. According to some,
Cornelius' dogs were construed as diabolical
familiars, and one of them haunted the sage,s
dying bed, ready to spring upon his soul as it
quitted the body. The real Cornelius, as far as
we can glean from his own rvords, was far
The iegendary Cornelius
from this Satanic monster. In submitting his
Agrippa degenerated
manuscript lor his masterly Occulta into the horrid magician
Philosophia to his mentor Trithemius, Cornelius of nursery rhymes.
wrote that his aim was only to ,vindicate
lnhis Occulta Phrlosophia, Agrippa was in a
against the il1 words of calumniators and
direct line of thought from the Neoplatonists of
restore that ancient Magic, studied by all the
Alexandria and Byzantium; he added to this
wise, purged and freed from the errors of
cabala and the Paracelsan doctrine of
impiety, and adorned with its or,vn reasonable
sympathies, and demonstrated how it all tied
system'.
in with the nature of the First Cause, that is,
Trithemius (ar that time Abbot ol St lames,s
God and Creation.
in Wurzburg) wrote him kindly bur pertinent
Book I deals with the threelold world: the
advice:
world of the elements, the world of the heavens
Speak ol things public to the public, but of and the world of sacred mysteries. Cornelius
things lofty and secret, only to the loftiest shows how each of these worlds interconnects
and most private of your friends. Hay to an with its 'virtues' and 'essences'. The way to all
ox and sugar to a parrot. Rightly interpret this for Cornelius was by experiment and
this, lest you, as some others have been, be research.
trampled dorvn by oxen. Book II, the celestial world, is a world of
sacred numbers, $zthagorean geometry and
However Cornellus, ever a Germanic thunderer, lewish gematria.
couldn't resist placing before the oxen ,a Since Book III of the Occultq philosophia is
pabulum unlitted' to rhem. He attracted the a how-to-do-it manual on the higher stages of
scorn and displeasure ol the Divine Dignitaries theurg,, it seems 1ike1y that Cornelius did have
of Dole. But at least he refrained lrom finding a instruction direct from Trithemius in cabala
publisher for the time being. and ceremonial magic (which is what Dee later
 Cornellus Agippa, Henry
(

,. ;t
trtt !^
'\, ,-tl
seized on). Although Cornelius didn't publish salary lrom the French Court, Cornelius was
all ol this officially, his reputation as a sorcerer invited by a friend, Father Aurelius, to settle in
alarmed the German officials. Antwerp and practise magic with him and
The Emperor arranged for him to be shipped another lriend, Augustine Furnario.
off to London, to John Colet, Dean of St Paul's. He was unpopular at the French Court
There is no evidence that Cornelius actually did because he refused to perlorm cheap magic
meet Co1et, although he is supposed ro have tricks, and so he upped and went to Antwerp. It
lodged at Colet's house in Stepney where the was a nightmarish journey with his entourage
two men buried their noses in the Epistles of St of nine persons and no money. At last he got a
Paul (in angel-magic, more probably). It was licence to print his works. lohn Wier, who was
now 1511; Cornelius was only 25 after al1 this, to include Agrippa's biography inhis De
so the emperor marched him off to fight with Praes tigii s Daemonum I ncan ta tio n i bzzs ( 1 5 63),
the German army against Italy. Agrippa lived in his house and upheld Agrippa's
managed to squeeze in a good few lectures on reputation to the end. Wier said that the
Plato in the universities of the conquered Arbatel, Book IV of the occulta Philosophra ,
Italian cities before being taken prisoner by the was not by Cornelius, even though King lames I
Swiss at the Battle ol Pavia. It is said that his was later to maintain, inhis Daemonologie,
magical manuscripts, tucked into hanging that it was.
pockets under his uniform, were scattered on But people in his household were dropping
the iield ol battle. with the plague like nine-pins (in fact, al1 nine
He was released and rescued lrom a really pins), including his little wife whom he just
low ebb the philanthropic Marquis of
b1, managed to catch in his arms when he rushed
Montferrat. Back in Pavia, he lectured on the home before she died.
Pimqnder and was dubbed Doctor olLaw and Just as all this was happening Henry VIII
of Medicine by the open-mouthed Pavian invited him to London, and other (im)famous
University Senate. influential and powerlul people invited him
The militant magus campaigned against into their service. But Cornelius now wanted to
religious superstition a1l over north Italy, his put the well-being ol his children first, so he
wife trailing a1ong, from town to town. In remained in Antwerp.
15 18, aged 32, Agrippa was appointed In 1530 Cornelius, aged 44, wrote his On
Advocate and Orator ol the free town of Metz. the VGni1/ oJArts and Sciences, a tongue-in-
Here he worked as a doctor, healing those cheek attack on Court and Ecclesiasts. It
smitten with the plague, using alchemical contained enough evidence for courtiers and
arcana derived from antimony and dioscordium prelates to traduce him as a magician. His plan
(as Cro11 did). His acerbic tongue could not be to write his defence of Queen Catherine of
curbed as he railed against his 'brotherkins', England whom Henry VIII wanted to divorce
the lriars at Metz. Bound to leave after this, he was thwarted because of creditors and conmen.
returned to Cologne where his wife was Instead of the walls of Hampton Court around
plagued literally to death. him, Cornelius faced the wa11s of Brussels
His wanderlust took him to Switzerland prison. Thanks to his iriends, though, he got a
where he was able to work as a physician and speedy court hearing, where he called for
councillor in Fribourg, and settle for another justice not mercy. His speech was vitriolic in its
wife ca11ed Loyse Tyssie, a girl of 19 lrom attack on a system oijustice that had done
ceneva (by whom he had six children), and for nothing for its citizens. With panache
whom he wrote On the Pre-eminence oJWoman, unparalleled (and without the gentleman in
and the Sanctif,i oJMarriage. question's permission) he proclaimed,'Accept
After trying for over two years to get a the Emperor as my baill' This would have

50
 Croll, Oswald

caused a rumpus had it not been lor the hasty and obscured by an unfortunate third marriage,
intercession of the Bishop ol Lidge and Cardinal and another bout in prison. The 1oya1 Wier
Campeggio. gives his death as 1535 in Grenoble, at peace
The publicarion of one volume ol his Occult with the Catholic Church and wirh the
Philosoplry in 153 1 and the publication of his Preaching Friars, in whose churchyard he was
Vqnttas i\ 1552 did not help his cause a.qainst buried. But even this is not certain.
jealous clergr. Cornelius admitted in the
Dedication the cynical spirit of the book: ,I
r'vrite this because I see men puffed up with :::':,1:'
human knowledge. True happiness consists not Eye make-up, lipsticks and perfumes were
in,understanding but in living understandingly alchemically prepared in ancient Egzpt and
Mesopotamia. In ES/pt the cosmetics industry
In the text oltheVanifit, Cornelius reviews thrived. Eye make-up was eirher black (kohl,
the ancient history of magic. ,Magicians,, he soot, burnt almond shel1s, sibnite or galena) or
says, 'are the most accurate inquirers into green, from malachite or conifer resin. Lipsticks
nature, and lrequently produce effects belore were made from animal fats, a similar process
the time ordained by nature., There is really to candle making.
nothing miraculous in producing roses and ripe Perfumes were extracted from flowers and
figs in March or in causing thunder or rain, aromatic resins. The method of extracting
transmutations or transfigurations. He goes on perfume for scents and pomades is ancient
to discuss Natural Magic, Ceremonial Magic indeed. Distilling appararus dating back to
and Mathematical Magic, explaining that 3500sc have been dug up in Mesopotamia. See
Theurg, or Divine Magic is the search for also Pelican; Soxlet Extractor.
communion with the good angels by
purilication ol the soul. As to cabala, Agrippa is
in favour of Christian cabala. He says the Jews !1311 9_i'il ! !!,.?i,: | ??|!?)
are no good at thar; rhey are only good at the One of the few alchemists who was nor
old |ewish Kabbalah. welcomed by Rudolph II of Bohemia.
Then Cornelius regrets his early wasted time Croll was reputed to be a follower of
and energy in writing his Occulta philosophta. Paracelsus, both in godliness and medical
The emperor demanded that Cornelius publicly miraculousness. Like paracelsus, he believed in
recant his present opinions. Cornelius the sidereal body of man: the star body, which
published an apolog, for his work, denying he corresponded to the constellations of the zodiac.
had said anyrhing that didn,t conform with the It was the Fa1l that brought disease into the
Catholic Church. The monks objected, but world, but man's inner nature is godly and can
Cornelius stated that authority came from God influence his outer nature and effect cures
alone; he cited Luther as both heretic, and alchemically.
unconquered in argumentl Croll's wanderings around the universities
On alchemy, Cornelius is deliberately woolly of Germany and the palatinate are a subdued
and contradictory. The blessed subiect of the repeat of Paracelsus: defiant stridings against
most holy Philosopher's Stone is not to be the science of Aristotle and Galen. He joined
spoken of without perjury. But Cornelius does Marburg University in lST6, graduating with a
say something of it in riddles. It is not too fiery, Doctorate in Medicine in 1582. He then moved
nor altogether eanhy. He concludes with a round Heidelberg, Strasburg and Geneva
diatribe against a1l alchemists who do not Universities, coming to a temporary rest in
practise the spiritual Art. Lyon with the d'Esnes family, where he was
Cornelius' last years were poverty stricken tutor from 1583 to 1590.

51
 :--:9--^jh
Croll, Oswald

.,' .\ffi
-tr c -
.'
+- : _'
Thereafter, he rutored the household of have been that Croll mentions some herbs that
Count Maximilian of Pappenheim in Tr"ibingen, came from Rudolph's estate in Brandeis and
belore turning up in Prague in 1597, ',vhere he the envious Emperor lelt left out. So Croll was
practised medicine, but not chez Rudolph. He got rid oL
worked onhis magnum opus, his Bastltca His Basilica r,vas kept in several editions at
Chymica, from 1598 and dedicated it to his the Lobkovic and other libraries famed
patron, Prince Chrlstian I olAnhalt, Bernburg, throughout Bohemia.
Upper Palatine, rvhose physician he became. After his death Croll was referred to as
There is some mystery as to what happened something of an authoriry. Robert Burton
next. Croil obviously moved around Bohemia thinks highly of 'Osu,aldus Crollius, phys &
as agenl for Anhalt, among the rich and alchemist, ... auth. Basilica Chymica, a Tract on
recondite. The alchemist peter Vok von Signatures, or the alchemic sympathies ol
Rozmberk rnas in close contact rvith him. Vok certain drugs & plants lor certain diseases, &
had a huge library at Trebon lull of paracelsan co'. The Anatomy oJMelcrncho| is interspersed
manuscripts, rvhich Croll is known to have wlth approving comments on Croll's
visited in 1607. The Basilica was finished in understanding ol the 'magnetically cured'
1608 and included a lerrer to Croll lrom Vok weapon salve and the po.,vers of precious
(the letter is dated Trebon, il Augusr 1608), as stones, especially salt of Corals ('to purify the
well as the Treatise on Signatures dedicated to blood for all melancholy affections'), and gold,
Vok (the dedication is dared 1O September wherher potable or 'fulminating', which 'shal1
608).
1 imitate thunder and lightning, and crack louder
Croll had acquaintances among the most than any gunpo.,vder'.
sought-after alchemists of Bohemia, Moravia The occult magician Elephas L6vi relers to
and the Palatinate: Bulderus, Court physician Croll as an initiated doctor contemporary with
at Trebon, Michael Maier, Zerotin, Khunrath, Khunrath, author of the Book oJ Signatures, or
Thurneysser. He had access to the best libraries True and Vital AnqtomJ oJ the Greqter and
of Paracelsan coilections, notably those of Lesser World. This work, his Basilica , develops
Pontanus and Lobkovic. He came to know exponentially the Tablet of Hermes, 'as above,
poets (even including in his BaseTeca some so below', meaning everything in the
verses of the sensational Englishwoman macrocosm has its correspondence in the
'Westonia') and publishers such as the De Bry microcosm.
and the Wechel dynasties. God and nature have put their signatures on
Somehow he displeased Rudolph. He $,ent all their rvorks, so that those with occult
to visit the earless Edward Kelley at the castle training rvill be able ro read this divine book ol
at Most, lvhere Rudolph had imprisoned him in signatures, of sympathies, of antipathies, of all
order, perhaps, to elicit lrom him the secrets of things in creation, from the highest stars down
the elixir. to minerals, crystals, flowers and smallest
\,Vhether Croll died belore the end of 1608 or pebbles.
in 1609 is not clear, but it was in prague, and We lack the grammar, said Croll, to read the
his precious manuscripts 'secret matters, got mysterious language of these worlds. It is
into the hands of Rudolph. people talked of a eniolded in the ancient Hermeric hieroglyphs,
chest ol strange and wondrous rvritings, which which corresponded to the laws ol geometry,
presumably Rudolph r,vas itching ro acquire. Ir form, movement, equilibrium. Holv to
could have been that Rudolph was not too rediscover this lost universal language ol the
happy about the dedication of the Basilica to sacred letters ol Thoth, the language of the
his rival Anhalt, and the dedication ol the creative Word, the Logos: this is what Croll
Signatures to a pretender like Vok. It could tries to do.

<,
 Cupellation

{..) ar
Cryptic figures Cube

The cube represented the earth in ry/thagorean,

Platonic, and Indian traditions. In Egvpt the
Pharaoh is often depicted sitting on a cubic
throne. Cube statues were especially prevalent
in the Middle Kingdom (2040 t78jnc), and

t$of.rr :Jfi ,',I',i;: I;T,'.1T'#,1j:[#:'T, ill,

x& v - the black earth lrom ll,hich the spiritual ,King,
arose.

t"tlil,U*tt#
:slqtiff.
6t'$Pt
* aa
w
tr
Cryptic figures. In Andreae's Chl:mical Llteclding the first
set of cryptic figures shown here r,vas inscribed on the
iron door of a sepulchre that Christian Rosencreutz The atomic make-up ol
discovered on the iifth day of the narrarive. The meaning a cube of boron seen in
is: 'Here lles buried Venus the falr woman u,ho has a trance state by the
undone manv a great man. both in ibrtune, honour, theosophist Annie
blessing and prosperity.' The second series of cryrptic Besan T.

figures reads: 'When the fruit ol m),. tree shall be

completely melted, I shall rvake and be mother of a
king.'Thls rexr \vas said to be inscribecl on a tablet la1ou*i!
behind the couch ol\renus. A gourd, or lo\,\rer part of a still, used in the
alchemical operation ol distillation.
Such figures include anything to veil arcana
liom the profanet Alchemy is riddled with
secret languages, acrostics and rabbinical 9apett?::on
anagrams, so abstruse as to be nightmarish. The method of blasting out refined gold from
The German adept Michael Maier explains the impure merals in a porous crucible or 'cupel,.
Rosicrucian letters R.'. C.'. thus: Amongst alchemists in the pre-Christian era, it
D.lvmme.zii,rv. skSgg hka.x. presumably was a method known to the Mediterraneans of
Maier had the key to this, but it was buried extracting precious metals lrom their ores by
rvith him in 1.622. lusing with lead and blasring off the base
metal oxides. Silver could be separated from
t?r!i:"li?i gold by the ingenious addition ol salt and
?rv barley to the lead and other metals.
Coagulation or congelatlon. See also
Congelatio.

53
 version olAhron's Pandects lrom the
Jundeshapur Academy; and it was here in 730
that the magus Abdul Alhazred reputedly
composed his grimoire, known as the
Necronomicon.
Damascus harbours the tomb of the greatest
:::'":::Igi:_ Kurd in history, Saladdin, under a simple white
A book on Witchcraft, published in Edinburgh dome. It also guards the graves of two brilliant
(1597) and twice in London (1603). See also if little known alchemists: Ibn Arabi (d. 1240)
James M and I. and Ibn Al-Qifti (d. 1248). See also Caliph; Ibn
Arabi; Khalid; Necronomicon; Pandects.

P,i-i:::i:tg
The process of inlaying ornaments with gold or P-::1:i-':i::
silver. Originating with the metallurgists and A metaphor for 'anatomy', used by Paracelsus
alchemical gold workers in Byzantium and to explain how old doctors, in trying to heal
later in Damascus during the early Christian people, clung to anatomy without trying the
era, damascening was also associated in the transmutational medium of alchemy (mercury
crusades with the engraving of magical glyphs and so on).
in the swords of the Knights Templar.
De Alchimia, De Animalibis, De
D_iT3:::-: ,,f"1:!i:ib!:
The city of a thousand years before Abraham, The three main alchemical treatises of Albertus
which suffered all manner of muddle from the Magnus of Ratisbon and Cologne (c.
Romans, Persians, Umayyads, Abbasids and 1193-1280), a scholastic doctor, mildly
Fatimids, Zangids, Christians and Mamluks. interested in alchemy - if by default or panic.
As the centre of the Umayyad Court A Dominican, his learned works include
(661-749), Damascus was the birthplace, in commentaries on Pliny and Aristotle, and
660, of the first Muslim alchemist, Prince studies on the seams of metalllc ore. His claim
Khalid. It was to this Court that the Persian to fame is as the greatest thirteenth-century
lew, Masarjawaih, brought his new Arabic mind and the teacher of St Thomas Aquinas.

Winged lion carvings in

the lvalls of Damascus
going back to OId
Testament times.
 Decan

?::,v 1628. On the.4.[otions oJ the Heart and Blood

was published by Fitzer in Holland albeit in a
A family of brilliant engravers and printers who
small book ol only T2 pages, printed on thin,
moved between the Netherlands, Germany and
cheap paper and full of typographical errors,
Bohemia in the sixteenth and seventeenlh
which would have made the grand old Master,
centuries. Through extraordinary interconnec_
Theodor the Elder, turn in his grave. See also
tions and marriages, they mixed with whoever
Family of Love; Fludd; lennis; Maier.
was important in the occult world. They
engraved and printed a great many emblematic
alchemical books, while in protestanr England
there was an uneasy suspicion of such
"::?::
publishers. The De Brys may well have been A span of ten, a series of ten; found especially
in recipes among the Byzantine alchemical
Rosicrucians. Theodor the Elder, at least,
texts for combining metals in different degrees
belonged to a secret society called the Family of
Love. - i.e. a decade of iron, a decade of go1d, which
has ten orders or degrees in it.
In the 1590s, he had emigrated lor religious
reasons from Lidge to Frankfurt where he set
up his printing and engraving business with D::ii
his two sons, lohann Israel and Johann
Theodor. Ir was Theo the Elder who published A segment of ten degrees in a circle divided
the marvellous voyages of discoveries to the into 36 segments, according to the cosmic
New World, including John White's Voycges to system of the Babylonians (circulated in Ibn
Virgtnia, Hakluyt's VoJqges and the Wahshiyya's work and in the picatrix) and the
Peregrinatlonum [n Indiam Orientalem et cosmologz of Hermes Trismegistus:
Occidentalems which his son,s son-in-1aw,
Matthew Merian the Elder, finished engraving
in 1634. Lucas lennis published Maier,s"
Symbola Aureae with copper plates by Rudolph
de Bry (161 7), and Theodor the younger
u.K:-,''
published Maier's Atalanta Fugiens with i"
engravings by Matthew Merian (1 6 1 B). This (\\ i
ceaseless pair also published Robert Fludd's
massive Utr[usque (1617 , 16tB and 1 6 1 9). The o
l"-\\\t
, -.-\ \\\\\\"'
family linked with other publishers: Lucas ==\----i\I lir,

Jennis, the Wechels (who published Dee and

Bruno) and the plantins, publishers of the
alchemist Nicolas Barnaud - al1 of them As Hermes explains to his pupil Tat (in the
involved in secret brotherhoods of some sort or text of the Corpus Hameticum):
another. I have already hinted, my child, that there is
The De Bry clan conrinued publishing a body that envelops the entire world:
daring and alchemical medical works well into represent this body to yourself as a circular
the seventeenth century, including the De l,lotu figure, for it is the form of the A1l ... picture
of the English courr physician William Harvey now that, under the circle of this body, have
(1628). Haruey had been lecturlng on the been placed the 36 decans, in the middle
movemenr ol the blood since 1616 but hadn't between the universal circle and the circle of
dared publish anything unril anorher De Bry the zodiac... moving along the zodiac with
son-in-law, William Fitzer, took up his cause in the planets, and then, being at the heart of

55
 De Ca.us[s

the revolutlon of the All, they have, He was not so much interested in alchemy as
alternatively, the same power as the seven in the visions ol his showstone or crystal ball
(governors). (which can stil1 be seen in the British Museum,
The 56 decans were originally Egzptian sidere- London).
a1 gods, whose names were preserved in the
Like a meteor scattering sparks, Dee zoomed
E$/ptian temple archives. They ruled over the through the galaxy ofEuropean glitterati, then
sections of the zodiac according to ten degree tailed ofl into the darkness. He started off life
divisions. So there were three decans per star- in the swing ol Henry VIII's court, the son of a
sign: three for Aries, three for Taurus, three for court official. He became tutor to Robert
Gemini and so on. Dudley, Edward Dyer and Sir Philip Sidney, and

Bruno's diagrams of his decans for was hugely influential as Queen Elizabeth's
internalizing his magic memory system are astrologer and '007' secret agent.
particularly quaint. They were probably He was drawn to philosophy of the sort that

inspired by the Picatrlx and the decans painted the English university system did not allow for:
on the fresco in the Palazzo Schifanoia at Neoplatonism, and the exciting new alchemical
Ferrara. Hermeticism olPico and Reuchlin. about lvhich
orthodox Christianity was uneasy. These
subjects were, horvever, taught at universities
D:
l:::t: abroad: Paris, Padua and Krakorv. Dee was,
therefore, easily persuaded to go to poland by
The Book oJ Causes or Lhe Secret oJ Creation
Prince Laski (1536-1605), whose visit to
belonging to the pile of unauthorized works in
England in 1583 included that extraordinary
alchemy assigned to Apollonius of Tyana. It
conference in Oxford at which Bruno put do',vn
was not until Silvestre de Sacy in 1799 drew
the pundits ol scholasticism.
attention to it that anyone thought to quesrion
Dee had already lecrured extensively in
its origins; and it wasn't until the twentieth
Europe to stunned audiences on magical
century that J.Ruska established that the famed
mathematlcs, and he had alreadv
Emerqld Tablet actually comes from the Book oJ
published his .Monas Hieroglyp hica
Cquses and not from the hands of Hermes
(1564) and Prelfuce to Billingsley's
Trismegistus.
Euclide (1570).
The whole De Causis is a Neoplatonic
By 1581 he had started his
cosmolog,, explaining in 'as above, so below,
summoning ol angels and had just
detail the aphorisms of the Emerald Tablet. tt Dee's
had Edward Kelley land upon him
dates from the rime of the Caliph Al Ma'amun Monas
at Mortlake, where people would symbol
ofBaghdad (813-83f), and was translared for
turn up in droves - including the
the West into Latin by Hugh ol Santalla in the
Queen - on the pretext of a free evening's
1 100s. Taken out of context, it was frequently
discussion on politics, philosophy and
quoted in medieval commentaries such as the
mathematics, plus rhe loan of Dee's
Secretum Secretorum, which was lor many
revolutionary books, and no doubt plenty of
centuries assumed to be Aristotle's.
food and drink. So when Laski invired Dee to
Poland in rhe autumn of 1583, the party

'-llr llli i1??i:!???) included Dee, Kelley, both their wives and
Dee's three children, plus the alchemical
A brilliant scholar, marhematician, diplomat, paraphernalia about which Dee had consulted
courtier, traveller, magician and tramp. the angel Gabriel.
More trivla has been written about ,Doctor' Once in Krakolv (March 1584), Dee got two
John Dee than about any other English magus. things underway: his sessions with Kelley

56
 --{
H --J
D e Hep ta rch I a,1,11,s t lco
ffi-R"
W,.'
---._
-

scrying ('surfing rhe net,) lor angels, and his icent Lord and b1,'my incomparable friend
introductions round Krakou, Unirrersity's Edu,ard Kellel,divine water at the third hour
Professors olAlchemy. He had access to the befbre noon). And finallv on 14 December: .trlr
tine librarv of Hermetic material, including Edrvard Kellel, gave me the $rater, earth and
Hannibal Rosseli's rroluminous pimander all.'
Comme ntdnes , the picltrix. pico, s Concluslons Ir seems more likely than not that Edrvard
and Bruno's Shadows. Kelley rvas hoodlvinking Dee, for on 4 February
Laski recommended mingling lr,ith Rudolph 1588 Dee rranslerred ro Kelley his books and
Il's clique. There was Hapsburg money lor lif'e 'the porvder' and discharged his obligarions in
il Dee could make alchemical gold lor writing. On 16 Februaryr 158E, Kelley lsfl
Rudolph's treasury and predict good lortune lor Trebon lor Prague, and the lollowing month
this ever-need1, Emperor. So Dee and Kellev Dee and lamily departed lor England and thelr
went to Prague, rvith various devotees in tou,. ransacked home in l,,tortlake and never sar,l
such as the renegade Catholic pucci, tvho sau, Kelley again.
Dee as a prophet. Dee toid Rudolph after
Never again did Dee bask in the confidence
seances on 21 and 22 September 15g4 that he of Queen Elizabeth nor ol lames. Alter 1,ears ol
possessed rhe secrer of the Stone only t51eur1-, waiting he lvas granted the \,Vardenship ol
the angels (Uriel particularly) not his ou,n Christ's College, Manchester. Nothing
knowledge. Nor,r, rhe properries ol the red concerning his alchemical experiments uras
por,r,der thar Dee and Keliey had brought with
heard until 1602 rvhen Dee, ,on the brink ol
them were u,eakened tr,ith use, and Dee no the grar,e' and back in Ailortlake, was visited by
longer succeeded in projecrion. He incurred the Archangel Raphael and promised bodily
suspicion. health and rhe Phllosopher,s Stone ar last. But
\\tithin a year rvord spread about the cryrstal Dee died in the laith of his angels in 1608,
ball, and on 29 May 1586 Dee and companr, rvithout the Stone, and in penury, harring been
ivere expelled from prague by pope Sixtus V lor reduced to selling many of his precious books
performing black magic. In addition, Madimi, to buy food. His lil'e reads like the rise and lall
one of the 1,oung lemale spirit guides had gone of a Greek hero, whose 'most small fault' u,as
too far in her naked amempt in urging Dee and his ou,n gullibilit1,.
Kellev to r,r,if'e-su,ap. They sheltered at Count
Rozmberk's casrle at Trebon lor a while, and at
oe Mystica
Iast Dee on 19 December 1596 notes in his lr11rchia
Diaty: De Heptcrrchia,4,btstica (On th€ ltysticat Rule oJ

E.K. made projection rvith his ponder in the the Seven Planets) is one ol lohn Dee,s
proportion of one minim (upon an ounce manuscripts, written during 1582 J, lor
and a quarter ol mercurl,) and produced summoning angels u,ho guard the planets: a
nearly an ounce of best gold; u,hich gol<1 rve how-to do-lt notebook lvith lormulae and
afterr,r,ards distributed lrom the crucible. magic letter squares, rituai postures and
supplications. Dee's tutelory.angel is Uriel
Dee lirred at Rozmberk's expense and on mone1,. through rvhom the presences are ir.n oked r,vith
scrounged from Count Laski in poland until, on utmost piett,.
1O May 1587, he nores in his Diary,: .E.K. did
The immediate inspiration lor Dee's
open the Great Secret to me, God be Thanked', grimoires is Cornelius Agrippa's Occulta
and on 24 August: 'Vidi aquam divinam Phtlosophia, rvhich stems from the magic-
demonstratione magnilici domini et amici mei master Trithemius, and the ividely studied
incomparabilis D Ed Kellei anre meridiem rertia Picatrlx, nhich floated around anonvmouslv in
hora.' (l sa',v in a demonstration bv the magnif,- the medieval rvorld.
 (!-

r-: !.

Dei wax seals, a lairground trolley with seals for

wheels.
'Of God' or 'of Dee'l As in 'The Seal of, the The Great Seal, the Sigil of Truth, Emeth,
Truth ol God' or 'The Seal ol the Truth of Dee', was placed on the tabletop and covered with
rvords inscribed in the great seal that was set red silk, on top of which the crystal was set.
under the crystal ball used in Dee's magic. When the time was ripe and the 'dignification'
In the design of the Great Seal ollohn Dee, of Dee and Kelley complete, the sessions of,
found in his notebooks, the Spiritual Diaries, crystal gazing could begin.
the word 'Dei' hits the eye first, printed in the
middle of the page at the top, then repeated
b?:li',?'^
immediately underneath, above the main P:111',:*1, ?l? l' !l3? _l?|l)
diagram of the seven-poinred star. The Great An alchemist, born of noble stock in Naples. In
Seal was all part of the paraphernalia ol Dee's the succession ol'Natural Magic' alchemists
seances. He r,vas, according to his notes, such as Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus,
commanded by the Archangel Uriel to prepare Della Porta was one of the few peaceful
very carefully for the sittings at which he and alchemists, able to live in sty1e. He travelled
his scryer Kel1ey would have communications luxuriously, not penuriously, throughout ltaly,
Dee's design for his
lvith angels. France and Spain. Sensitive to natural magic
Great Seal, shorving
The preparations included a special table ol (what we might today call unseen forces), he
various names lor God
and names for angels many colours, but particularly the primary published his lirst book in 1558 when he was
and spirits, including colours, with magic sigils and letters all over but 13 (if we assume the birthdate his
the temprress Madimi. the legs in yellow. The rvhole table was put on biographer gave is accurate): Magia Naturalts ,
a good book, as juvenilia goes, on psychologr
and rhe power ol suggestion.
DET The first edition of this youthful manual
was the most widely read and appeared in
Latin, French, Italian, German, Dutch and
Arabic, while the second edition ran to 20
volumes of which the first section contained an
extract of Cornelius Agrippa's Occult
Philosophy. The rest was a kind of how-to-do-ir
handbook, with recipes for herbals, perfumes
.I: and gunpowder, and a host of observations on
J) (.\ the telescope and Paracelsan physiognomics.
r.
ct t\ One whole section was devoted to alchemy,

it tlt which Della Porta retrieved from its mystique.

He said the thing to do was to be scientific and
7il to learn lormulae lor melting metals and
li 1,1 making medicines for practical healing.
The important departure from the earlier
natural magic were his observations on
hypnosis. In the Eighth Book of the second
edition he described experiments on hypnosis,
lvhich later impressed Goethe. Giambattista
popularized the natural sciences and cleared
away the jungle of jargon surrounding the
hitherto 'secret' art ol alchemy; he translormed
 magrc into common sense. While his Magia
Naturqlis remains the best knor,vn ol his
collections, he wrote separate books on
Physiognomics, Secret Meanings oi the
Alphabet, and Distillation. He advocared simple
orderly practical experiments; he swept away
the shadows (De Umbrts) of Bruno, eventually
scorning glyphs and Egyptian mysreries, even
though as a yourh he had certainly shared
Bruno's interesr in them. By 1600 he had
attributed it a1l to a healthy imagination.
Giambattista's books ran to many editions
and found their way to the besr libraries ol
Prague and Bohemia and to Dee,s librarv at
Mortlake.

R[ght: Giambafiista Della po[a, after a portrair in his De

Distillatione (Rome, 1 608).
Ba1rry: Engraving to illustrate analogies between human
and lorver animal lif-e.

!: "1,:lit:!:i
A standard tvork on mining and metallurg,
published in Larin (Base1, 1556). Georg Bauer,
alias Agricola the author, was a physician for
the miners of Joachimstal. The lormat of the
book reflects its contents: the woodcut ,6
illustrations nearly emphasize the technical
skills of the designers and printers. As lrrell as
metallurgz, the book has sections on extracting
gold, analysis of metals, of salt and saltpetre
and other common materials. It is a practical
and clear handbook illustrating laboratory
alchemy. See also Celestial Agriculture.

{
i
-,:.', .(

Interpreted on two levels, physical and

.,I
metaphysical. Physically, dew contains the Salt
fi
that acts upon rhe Sulphur and Mercury of the li
prime matter. Metaphysically, it is the conrenrs I(
ol the divine cup: alchemically the elixir of the
Philosopher's Stone.
Dee's title-page for his Monas Hterogtyphica
has strange alchemlcal emblems in the pillars Gracile!gena'
Della. Porto: De humana physiognomon ia. lSgL.

59
 Dlbikos

supporting the 'theatre' in u,hich the mercurial had taken on a golden hue, and the
hierogll,ph is centred. In the left-hand pillar the industriaiists al the laboratories talked ol a
Sun is rveeping der,t into a chalice, in the right- nerv life-giving substance that the),'lvere eager
hand pillar, the A^oon is rveeping derv into a to exploit. Could they take a short cut in
chalice. and the motto underneath reads 'De labour, time and money? They tried' They 11's1s
rore caeli et pinguedine terrae del tibi Deus' utterly unable to replicate Barbault's elixirr yet
(Nlay 6s6 eir,,e 1,ou ol the derv ol heaven and ol he had been totallY exPlicit.
the latness of the earth). The Latin origin lor 'derv', 'ros - roris', has
Derv is the subiect ol one of the exquisite been used r,l,ith double enrendre by
Rosicrucians (ros : de\,v; rosa : rose), while
the Germanic origins of 'der,v' (dealv < dau <
\Iitches preparing tou < daurvaz) in alchemistic false etymologr
magic beverages

0d
I0
w
\
har,e been linked r,r,ith 'devi1' (deoflol < diubul
< tiufal). So 'derv' can be fahrreh/God or its
very oppositel

4 Dibikos
d
A tno-spouted still, just as a three-spouled one
u'as called a'tribikos'. See also Pelican'

Dignification

The practice ol making onesell lvhol11'

prepared, as in the angel-coniuration of [ohn
Dee, by praying to God and purilying onesell
belore performing the seance and muttering the
mantras. Cornelius Agrippa inhis occulta
Philosophra points out that the key to
performing theurgy is 'the dignilying of men to
this so sublime virtue and power'. The main
steps in dignilication are to give up the
pictures olthel'lutus Liber:big sheets or appetites ol the flesh, to meditate profoundly,
tarpaulins are spread out to catch the der,v that and to perform rrarious penances. See also
is raining dorvn lrom radiant beams on high, Theurgy.
r,vhile in the loregound a man and a woman
are squeezing out one ol the sheets to catch Diocletian (c. 245-316,\
this precious substance. There is an interesting
coro11ary: the modern alchemist Armand Roman Emperor (reigned 284 305) who
Barbault r,vas inspired by this 'delv' picture to abolished alchemf in Eg/pt in 'u292' As
perlorm his orvn X,'lagnum Opus, by collecting Emperor ol a teetering tetrarchy surrounded by
der,v in sheets (as in the picture) as the Goths antl Persians, anyihing that smacked of
distilling agent for his prime matter. His \\tork, unorthodoxrY terrilied Diocletian, rvho needed
using less than 4 pounds ol earth (not erren an) vay to stitch together his 'Roman mantle'.
18OOg) took 22 ,\ears to mature. When tested So he persecuted first the Manicheans, then the
in German pharmaceulical laboratories in the Christians, then anyone doing rvhat he sar'r' as
1960s, the elixir obtained delied anal.vsis. It threatening alchemists, astrologers, cabalists.

60
 Dolrnan
,H-=i
-4
-. ---
ffi-.85-- -i',

Ri.o,',.
oi:l{:lr th" ^1.:lus1:.
(1 Andr6s de Laguna (1499-1560). In rhe
:.f,' i.;' € a:-

f99l sixteenth century Zsambosky of Bohemia

Although shrouded in mystery, he greatly
prepared an edition lor his famous library of
influenced alchemical thought in the fi,liddle
medico alchemical books.
Ages. Legend has it that Dionysius was
conrrerted by St paul, and that he travelled
lrom Athens to paris. There he incurred the
':d::11.d101
rvrath ol ollicials and was beheaded, but he
In sacred geomerry, a 12-sided solid. See
picked up his head, '"vashed it and carried it at
Chlorophyll; Rose Windorvs.
the level of his heart up to rhe top ol
Montmartre, then diedl
One olhis followers steeped a cloth in his
oolmel
blood, and that cloth became the French flag
A megalithic altar resting on two or three
knotvn as the Oriflamme, the gold flame, the
pillars, originallv a vault rvirh special
battle flag ol]oan olArc and her armies. r,l,hose
resonating properties. dependent on tension
war-cry was 'Monjoie, Saint Denisl, There
legend ends. The Latin ,Dionysius' becomes
'Denis' in French, and the great Gothic
Cathedral ol St Denis in paris was rhe home of
Abbot Suger the master-builder, friend ol
Bernard of Clairvaux. Chartres Cathedral is
visual evidence of Dionvsius' teachings.

ng)
'::::11*: lt 1o I
The greatest pharmacologist among the
Hellenic Greeks, and the most popular among
Arabian alchemists. He senred as a doctor in
the Roman armlu in the reign ol Nero (54-68).
His De,4,tater[G Medlca was the classic until the
nineteenth century. In it are described some
600 plants and their medical properties. Ir was
translated into Arabic by Stephanos, son ol
Basilios, and rvas known to Hunayn urho
corrected it. A,,tan1, of the Greek names lor drugs
rvere transcribed rather than translated.
It was the Emperor Constantine VII r,vho
persuaded rhe Caliph Abd a1-Rahman III
(reigned 929-961) in Cordova to accepr an
illustrated Greek codex to lacilitate further
translations ol Greek terms into Arabic.
A number of such manuscripts are still
presen ed in which Arabic, Latin and Castillian
names are entered dor,vn the margins ol the
Greek texts. The last major translator ol De
.4lqteria ][edica ol the Spanish Renaissance
Aiter thc title-pagc of Dioscorides, Vtrtttunt Simplicium
u,ho was interested in iatrochemistry was ,lled[ci naru m Zlrdr (L],on, 1 5 1 2).
 Draughr oJWisdom

betlveen rveight and thrust. Later developed

into Gothic cathedrals. See Goetici Vau1t. '_"19
Olten used for the continual slow heat
necessary lor alchemical, as opposed to
Drausht of wi-:dom
chemical, processes. For example, 'Digest in
Rottled in its Latin form. 'Poculum horse dung wine which has been poured in a
Pansophiae', this rvas said to pass on to the pelican lor two months ... you lvill see a thin
drinker universai understanding ol Azoth. pure substance like a sort of lat which is the
spirit of r,vine spontaneously evolved on the
surface ...' (instructions lrom Paracelsus). That
Alchemical diagram
ftom Geheime Figuren flamboyant eccentric, Thomas Urquhart, refers
(Altona. 1785). From to it in his Ekskuballuron, The /ewel Hidden in
the top: the rvinged the Dung Hill, and it rvas used in compressed
Godhead l'l I FF,
simile as a temperature gauge: red-hot > dung-
Jahveh, produces
hot > stone-cold.
universal nature, from
rvhich stem the lour
elements. out ol these Dunghill
are generated the
mineral, r,egetable and
Defined by Eirenaeus as: 'The p1ace, along with
animal kingdoms, in the
every other place, that the stone is found.'
centre olrvhich is
AZOTH, the universal
medicine, Philosophic Dull_ex
Mercury. The true
Draught ol\,Visdom is The hermaphrodite, sometimes known as
the understanding ol
Mercury Duplex, hall male, half female. Of the
the close relationship
benveen all things. Eg,rptian deities, Geb and Nut are the duplex
who are torn apart - earth from sky, matter
from mind; likewise Shu from Tenut - life from
order (form).

poc0LoH P^ilgoPl{ttrE
Esss

Eggs addle their way through alchemlcal nests,

especially philosophical ones: womb-1ike SECRETS
incubators or images of the world (,in the egg, OR,
therefore, are four things earth, u/ater, air An OPEN ENTRANCE
and fire ...'). Oil ol egg will rake excess TO THE
cholesterol out olyou, and, since egg also has
'chicken' in it, if you put it on a cur or burn,
that cut will grow tissue fast.
Shut-Palace
The ever-hopeful lifteenth-century of thc Krwc:
Cantaiairg.
peregrinator Bernard ol Trevisa is reported to
The greateft Tn"ersu&E in
have putrilied 20OO eggs in horse dung in his
desperare bid lor success. CHYMISTRY,
N.*. ryl _fo ftainlf DiGovaed.
Eirenaeus, philalethes, Conpofid
y a molt famous ENcr.rsn-uerv
l*:::T:ry1ii: Styling himGlf A No Nrtwu s -
'The Peaceable Lover of Truth, the Wanderer ol or €TR,A N€ES P HI LTLLETHA'
COSN'OPOLITA;
the Wor1d.' The most private and poetical ol
o,.6.I Infpiration and Readine.
alchemists. This mysterious and nameless anunedto rhcPxllosopnensSroxg "'
at hb Age of Twenty
-
seventeenth-century adept known as Eirenaeus tt r*Vea.i,-
AnnoDoniair re +5.
wrote his sad and moving testimony to the
trials and tribulations of an alchemist in his I for thc Bcnefit of all E,2ti!h-iea,
by w. C. Elq, a true Lov&
Introitus Apertus ad Occlusum Regis palatlum of An and Nrrure.
(The Open Entrance to the Closed palace of the
London, Prified by w. Godbidforlfillia^Cooot
King). He artlessly described himself as having m Little &.&rr6oto ne*t,near Littleltitoir, t e69.'
-
made the Stone and constantly being able to
renew his elixirs.
It appears that he approached the alchemist
George Starkey and demonstrated the
projection of the powder. Starkey described in then to Flamel. The Cosmopolite typifies the After the title-page ol
very lucid terms this 'artist' and how he made large majority of alchemists through the ages, Newton's copy of
go1d. Interestingly, Eirenaeus showed the 'cosmopolitans' who moved silently from Ellenaeus' Open
dlfficulties of dealing in alchemical gold in Enrranc€ (1669). The
country to country, writing their tracts by hand
figure of Nervton lurks
countries that each had different gold and disappearing tvithout trace. behind his or,vn
standards. People were suspicious and would William Cooper published in English such marginal note: 'This
not buy it, nor the elixir of the wise medicinal works of Eirenaeus that he could find, notably Entrance opened into
cures. The Open Entrance (1 669), his Marrow oJ the hidden Palace ofye
Eirenaeus said in his Preface to another of King.'
Alchemy and his Riplqt Revlved Cooper
his works, Riplqt Revived, that he owed his catalogued from hearsay another 1J books that
alchemical knowledge firstly to George Ripley, he could not trace.
Elements

,lr
!
iil

Elementl own as a tabiet. See also De Causis; Phvsic'

Planets: l'attu'lc t loes.
The beliel ol the ancients, Iargell' stemming
tiom Anaximander via Aristotle, that all matter
rvas a combination ol the four elements (lire
and r'vater, opposing air and earth) u'hich in
turn formed a basis ol all alchemicai
Operations. rvas lr,idel).'held by alchemists ol
the Mlddle Ages, until relined by Paracelsus in
the lilteenth century'.
According to him, rvater and earth lormed
the 'elemental body', 3n6 lire and air the
'sidereal body'. There are lour higher or
spiritual elements (the lathers), and lour lorver
or physical (the mothers). Therelore, all beings
have lour lathers and lour mothers. This idea
reaches back to the ogdoad, and fon'l'ard to g1,n1f6li6 representation ol thc Emeraltl Tdblet as the
genetics. See also Ogdoad; Xenophanes. alchemical Stone.

Elixll Enocf

One ol the nebulous words in alcheml' most one oi the transmitters ol the Priestly Art ol
diliicult to pin dou,n. Meanings range lrom the alchemy. One school ol thought in the Middle
'quintessence', the 'animated spirit oi a Ages supposed alchemy to be a giit that was
substance', the 'potion lor long lile' (the given lrom God via Raziel, the Angel ol
Chinese aim in alchemy 11165 fl16ly this), to the x,{ysteries, to Adam, rvho passed it on to Enoch.
Philosopher's Stone and Mercurv. The Chinese ln turn, Enoch passed on the gilt of alchemy to
used metals and minerals to prepare a Dir,'ine Abraham, tvho gate it to X{oses; lrom Moses it
Elixir lor translormation, but the Arabian Jabir uras received b;r Job rvho apparently septupled
went to torvn u,ith marro\v, b1ood, bones, lion's his possessions lvith the help ol the
urine, onions, peppers and pears! See also Philosopher's Stone.
Jabiribn Ha11an; Mercury,'; Philosopher's Stone; Enoch rvas identilied u'ith Hermes and the
Physika et N,l,vstika; Quadruplex. Prophet ca1led Idris in the Koran (buried,
according to the lradition ol Egrptian Muslims,
EmerSld rablel in a tomb in the Great Pyramid ol Cheops).
Hanoch is another variation of Enoch; he
one ol the oldest ol all alchemical texts, rvho rvalked n ith God . The signilicance oI
ascribed to Hermes or rhe Egyptian Thoth, Enoch lor alchemists was that he lvas
shor,l ing the principles of unirrersal analogies. suppose<l to possess a complete system of
The tablet rvas allegedly lound by Alexander alphabets and sigils, which could be drawn,
the Great in the tomb ol Hermes u'ho, n'ith a muttered or mouthed to ellect translormations
diamond st1,lus had engraved on the emerald ol metals or human beings, ol angels or other
plate 15 cryptic sentences. 'As above, so belor'r" spirits.
sums them up. The text was discol'ered to be lohn Dee u'rites in his Spiritual Dlaries
the basis ol the ninth-century Arabian Book oJ (Sloane N4S 3188, 22 December 1581 to 30 May
Causes, but it fleu' oll at a tangent since it I'r'as 1583) horv Enochian Letters lirst appeared to
so eminentllr quotable and took on a life ol its him through his scryer Kellel'and rvere

61
Qt /,

'; $i;,.'1.1
lq sff
.+ ,^'#9
\6'tvie{,;*

,Qtl*

Vzrtrq\
\.t\

e$2i1!e^ t$ n \Jv7<tt

A sample ol fohn Dee,s

angelic'calls' including
signs and Enochian
language thar Dee and
Kelley recetved in
seances.
Epopts

recorded on 29 X,larch 1582. Orrer the months, came to be rvorshipped as the god ol healing,
a complete Enochian Dictionary rvas revealed especiall1, at Epidaurus r,r,here lhere is a
and Kel1ev transmitted it as Enochian circular temple to him patterned r,l'ith caduceus
language. They received another Enochian text rvands. Cures lr,ere allegedlt' alchemical
betu,een April and August 1585 during their transformations perfbrmed at night and
star, in Bohemia (the Ltb€r Logtreth, in Sloane symboiized b), Esclepius's caduceus: the snake
3 1 89). r,r,ho sloughshis skin and rejuvenates.
Years before, on 1B january 1559 , Dee had The text knou,n as the Esclepius,
been given a cop1,ol Voarchadumia by Joannes supposedly urritten by Hermes Trismegistus,
Augustinus Pantheus. The book u,as like man)., \{as that part ol the Corpus H€rln€tlctun. or
others on cabala except that it sho',r,ed an bodl' ol Hermetic \'Vritlngs, u,hich had
alphabet ol Enoch. Was this the language ol remained in circulation up to the Renaissance
angels that the impressionable Dee memorized ever since its translation into Latin in the
and Kellev telepathized 25 ,vears later lrom second century AD. After the lervour of Ficino's
Dee's brain? Dee u,orked inseparably r,,,,ith rer,ival in 1460, it u,as edited 40 times benveen
Kelle1'and ner,er actuall),asserted that he sau, 1171 and 1641, and f. Faber Stapulensis'
anything himself. But his personality \{as so commentanr went through 11 editions.
magnetic that susceptible scn,ers might repeat Alchemists used the Escleplus as a spiritual
Dee's ideas as visions. See also Dee; Kelle),; handbook, a guide to creation and man's
Voarchadumia. creative po\vers. What particularly lired the
humanistic imagination is the passage rvhere
up:fl' Hermes speaks to Esclepius: 'And so, Esciepius,
a great miracle is man, a being u,orth1'of
These pop up lrom the 'epoptai' ol the re\rerence and honour because he enters into
Eleusinian mysteries: adepts or 'm)'stes'. the nature ol a god as ii he himself lr,ere a
X,lichael Maier uses the u,ord inhis Tlternts god.'
Aurea. This inspired not only Pico della trtirandola's

E,'g:1 Detail from the title-pagc ol Erra Pater's almanac

(c.1535).

In spiritual alchemlr, the 'right eye of the soul,

b1,u,hich it looks to the eternal. The left eve
@tua l0otht,
looks tou,ards tlme and this is the Parergon'.

E::a Par.er

The assumed name of an astrologer and

almanac-maker nho compiled (c. 1535) an
Ephemerides/astrological tables lor use in any
year. The title-page reads: The Pronosqtcacton
,fur ever oJ Ert"a-PGt€r: A /are born in /entery, a
Doctlur in Asn'onomye and Physicke...' See
also Decan; Galen; Ph).sic; Zodiac.

u::I.!iT loesculallo-s :r
Asclepi-usl

The son of Apo1lo and god ol medicine, rl,ho

66
Oratton on th€ Dignt1/ oJMan (and incidentally therefore kept a low profile, or else, like
Hamlet's 'What a piece of rvork is a man ...,) Cornelius Agrippa, re-interpreted the Esclepius
but it triggered off the rvhole ol the statues as dependenr on mathemarical magic,
Renaissance with a sort ol bumptiousness as to geomern and oprical illusions.
man's prowess. Alchemists rushed to animate
the Stone and form homunculi, in the light ol
Hermes' encouragement of man as the maker
u::::iil
ol earthly gods: 'Even as the Lord and the The Spanish Renaissance palace complex, built
Father... is the Creator ofHeavenly Gods, so outside Madrid in 156J-84. The secretive
man is the maker of the gods r,vho reside in the Hapsburg Philip II of Spain (reigned 1556 9E)
temples.' had 200 Hermetic books in his library at the
Hermes explains to a dumblounded Escorial, including.|ohn Dee's llonas
Esclepius that temple statues are imbued u,ith Hierogfiphlca and Ramon Lull's,,1rs
energ,'and can accomplish an infinity ol Combinandl. a sort of I Ching-cum-roulette by
manels. Thev are able to predict the future rvhich the nature of the universe could be
through dreams and can reward man r,vith joys divined. Philip was lascinated by Lull early on,
or sorro\vs according to his deserts. Man is good Catholic rhou.qh he was.
endoned rrirh godJl creative poners. He can
translorm sratues ol stone by adding ,virtu' _
energies, essences - fiom magically prepared fih::
herbs, scents, minerals and metals, and give The lifth element. Aristotle inhis De Caelo
them a sort ol totemistic pou,er. All rhis u,as asserted that while the lour elements are
very anti-church (idols) I Alchemists and magi reclilinear, ether is circular.
 John Dee r,vas associated u,ith the Family ol
Love, and frequented a bookshop sympathetic
to the sect. His Dutch lrlends Ortelius and
Lipsius rvere Familists; so were the printers C.
Plantin, and Theodor de Bry the Elder. Other
Family of Love Familists rvere John Everard (1582 1640), the
great theological commenrator on the Divine
An Hermetic sect, lormed in Holland in the Pirnander and translator of Maier's Tripus
sixteenth centun/. The members believed in Aureus, and Frangois d'Alengon, brother to the
Divine Illumination and Universal Lorre, rhe French King, and Catholic suiror to Protestant
citizens of the norld as one big lamily uni1s6 1n Queen Elizabeth I ol England.
brotherly love.
Since they did not believe in ritual or dogma Farragut (Farrachius or Farradj ben
ol any one particular church, thel,could Salim of Girgenti) (rhirreenrh century/)
participate in any church. Their detractors
exciaimed against rhem in the manner tl,pilied )ewish translator, the lirst to concentrate on
b1'John Rogers: 'They may joyne u,ith any turning Arabic or Jewish alchemical rvorks
congregation or Church, and live under the exclusively into Latin. His act ol devotion rvas
obedience ol any magistrate, be he nel,er so to translate the gigantic al-Hawi of Rhazes ol
rvicked or ungodl1,: the Turks, rhe pope, or Khorasan (865 925) inro the Liber Cont[nens,
lvhosoever.' at the insligation ol Charles of Anlou who had

,Rlgftr: Christof Planrin.

member ol the Famillr 6f
Love. founded in
Holland bl,Hendrik
Niclaes c. 1540.

Far right: Abraham ll.'tr/

Ortelius. ,t. r''.
l

I
lili\tl

Cfurft, Pl,ont^nt, M O.tdtu

 Figulus, Renedtctus, The Blessed Potter

Farragut recei\res the Blbliotheca Chemica

Arabic original ol
(1906) is a revised
Rhazes' L iber Ca n t i n ens
lrom an eastern catalogue ol over 1000
p0tentare. pages of alchemical books
and pamphlets, which,
together with the even
weightier Ferguson
Collectlon, is housed at
Glasgorv University, rvhere
lohn Ferguson rvas
Professor of Chemistry
Irom l5/4 to t915.

Figulus, Benedictus,
rfl ntellea P:ltter

The pseudonym of one

t Torpffer, an 'eremite ol
Utenholen and Hagenau',
r,l,ho apparently in his
'untutored zeal ...
cherished superlen,id
hopes that he rvould reach
become King ol Sicily and wanted ro expand the end ol philosophy'. Thus does A.E. Waite
his culture. Farragut tinished the translation on dismiss the Blessed Potter, alchemist.
13 February 1279. The maln edition 200 years Furthermore. 'that impassioned idolater ol
later r,veighed 1Okg (22lb)l Paracelsus ... has been cited as a rvitness to the
evidence ol secret Hermetic Societies belore the
Faust first Rosicrucian Manifesto.,Ecrna Faust conjuring up a
devil.
Frcternitatis'.
A magician ',1,'ho vearned to understand the
secret of lile, described in countless rales
strerching back to before the real filteenth-
century Dr lohannes Faust had even been bornl
The flrst literaryr collection of the Faust myth is
The Faustbook of Spiess (1582), lollorved by
the play - Dr Faltstus (1588-93) by
Christopher Marlorve, rvho had dlscovered
Cornelius Agrippa's and Paracelsus's obsession
with magical lranslormations and the
alchemical homunculus.

Fl'-s-l:onrllhl
A nineteenth-century Scottish academic and
bulkiest ol the alchemical bibliographers. His
 Fire

Figulus beat the circuir to prague and lelt in uii:

his collection of rvorks a most curious example
of a Hermetic N,lass containing variations in the As said the irrepressible Paracelsus,'That u'hich
Introits, Collects, Antiphons and other parts ol the lire operates is Alchemy, whether in the
the ordinary church service. Figulus claimed kitchen or in the universe'. In the Renaissance,
'They have become invocations lor the gilt ol books on Fire flared up (and flicker still) on
Divine Light on the Secrer ol phllosophy'. arcane shelves: Pyrotechny Asserted, The
Needless to relate, this Little Three-Part Golden Phtlosophy oJ Fire and Aesh Mezareph (The
Olympic Trectsury rvas dedicated to Rudoph II. Book of Purifying Fire), rvhich links alchemy
It lr,ould not surprise anyone who knerv this rvith Kabbalah.
devout groveller that he had lifted his l,4.ass
n holesale lrom the Alchent[cal Mass of
Firestone
Melchior Cibinensis. ln his preface tohis Little
Treasury the Blessed Potter guarantees rewards The modern alchemist lack Glass gives the
to those u,ho heip him find Paracelsan follor,ving advice to a novice: 'Aim at the
manuscripts. Let Paracelsus himself have the lirestone - a stepping stone first. It r,l il1
last rvord on potreg: 'Clay does not ol itsell transmute lor,r,er metals. Then aim at the
become a pot.' See also Tr,velve Heroes. Philosopher's Slone. You are at one you have
attained.'
The Alc/rcmical Mdss of
N,lelchior Cibinensis
Flamel, Nicholas (d. 1418)

Flamel and his wile Perenelle (flame pereniall,v)

,; were the symbolic alchemical couple.
The real man did exist. He was born
betrveen 1340 and 1345 at Pontoise in France
and was some sort of benelactor. Having
moved to Paris, he set up near the cemetery ol
the Holy Innocents as a notary or scrivener.
Alter a ferv years he moved u,ith other notaries
to a place near the portico ol Saint lacques de
1a Boucherie. He saved up with Perenelle's help
and built a little house opposite the two booths
he rented lor himseli and his copl,ists. A deed
still exists, signed a lew years after his
marriage, on which each spouse assigned his
or her worldiy goods to the other.
Here lacts cease and mvths take over. His
r'vork as a public scril,ener led him to deal in
books. particular)y Hermetic ones.
He had a dream that he discovered a
Kabbalistic book, the Book oJAbraham in
which alchemical glyphs appeared on every
seventh page in the margin, and his job r,vas to
lind the secret ol prime matter, which needed
to be decoded lrom rhe book.
 Flarnel. Ntcholas

!- (

The dream came true a long time later. Abrqham, Canches exclaimed that it was the
Flamel himsell describes, in his Interpretation lo ng-1ost Kabbalistic,4es h l,l ezarep h. Although
;f Hierogl,phic Image7r, ho1, he bought, lor Canches died belore he had completed the
nyo florins, a 'very large and ancient gold journey back to Paris rvith Flamel. symbolically
ernbossed book' that appeared to be made of Ftamel had linished his alchemical initiation by
lear,es ol tree bark instead ol paper. The cover the time he rvas back. He kner,r,rvhat to do to
rvas 'of copper, finely chased, deplcting curious complete the Grear Work, erren though it took
letters and figures' rhat Flamel could not another three years. 'At lengrh I lound rvhat I
decipher. 'The pages were written rvith great had sought, and I recognized it by the pungent
skill lr,lth an iron stylus in clear and beautilully smelll' Flamei complered the Work,
illuminated Latin characrers.' understanding norv hou to prepare prime
There ',vere 21 pages, divided into serrens, matter by lollorving the letter ol the Book: 'l
each seventh page being blank, except ior the could not har,,e lailed even if I had rvished to do
margins, rvhich rvere decorated in rrariations on so.' He and Perenelle lirst perlormed the Lesser
Ihe serpent theme. The lront page announced, Work (converting mercury to silr,er) on Xilonday
Abraharn the /ew, Prince, Priest, Levit€, 1 7 January 1382 at noon and on 25 April that

As tro loger and Phi los ophdr- ... rhen lol lolved year at 5.00 pm, they transmuted mercuryr into
curses on anvone u,ho dared to iook on the 'pure gold, vetlr definitel), superior to ordinary
book who was not a priest or scribe (Flamel gold'.
\,as). He couldn't decipher much ol the text Thenceforr,rrard Flamel became extraordi-
orher than that relating ro rhe making ol the narily rich. Sun,iving even no\v are 40 or so
alchemical Stone, r,r,hich u,as relatively clear, deeds relating to his gitts and donations to
except that the nature ol the prirne matter \\ras chapels and hospitals.
left to beautilul but crvptic pictures on pages 4 E,,ren though Flamel continued to live a
and 5, which Flamel could not inrerprer. So carelul lile nen s of his wealth reached the King
Flamel prar,ed to God (quored in Manget's u,ho sent M. de Cramois,r,, Chief Tax Inspector,
Bibliothec(r Chemicd Curtosa\:'Mav the Great to enquire into Flamel's circumslances.
\\tork that I have to do here belorv be begun, Cranloisl, tound him living out ol the barest
conlinued and brought to a right conclusion; eanhenware crockery. Flamel sent him arvay
ma1, 11 5. mine to enjoy in eternal bliss.' u,irh a flask lull oi the 'red porvder', hor,r,ever,
Since God \\ras nor fbrthcoming, Flamel to prevenl lurther kingly curiosity. Some sa1,
shou,ed the cryptic pictures to a medical lriend, that Perenelle died in 1397 or 1.404 and \vas
Ansealme, rvho rvanted to see the rvhole book. buried in the Church ol the Holy Innocents, and
but Flamel, abiding b1, the alchemical lan s ol thar Flame1 died aged 80 in 1418; that his
secrec)r, relrained from admitting that he had house, Great Gables. lost its gables but still
it. Ansealme interpreted the illusrration stood at number 51 Rue Montmorencv into the
misleadingly: the metallic spirit contained a nineteenrh century.
melal knorvn alchemicalll,as 'blood' (e.g. blood An alternatite stor;, is that Perenelle rvas
ol Mercun,, ol A4oon or oi Sun), but Ansealme reported dead in order to avoid persecution,
urged F1amel to mix quicksilr,er u,irh the pure and a .ur,ooden effig, of her, dressed in her
blood olyoung children. X,tercifullrr, Flamel clothes, r,r,as buried in one of the chapels that
relused. she had helped to build, rvhile she hersell
Ultimarel)', Flamei u,ent on a pilgrimage to disappeared to Surirzerland. Flamel requested
Compostela in northern Spain, to search lor the that he should be buried at her side, and rhar a
secret of prime matter. On the r,vay back he met pyramid should be erected over their romb.
a Bolognese merchant rvho directed him to a \\thile all the u,ood,burning uras going on, the
|er'rrish Dr Canches. On seeing the Book of living Flamel fled to Srvirzerland to join his
Fludd, Robert

wife. Some say they both disappeared lrom test the nature ol matter and the elements:
S\l itzerland to lndia for ever. 'Make a ball ollead, lairly l21gg ... Let the ball
tr{1ths persist. Particularll,, that F1amel rvas be A, the pipe B, the flask C ...'
discovered aiir,,e and u,ell in 1705 by an Uzbeck It could be a modern science textbook. Here
den,ish tvho described rhe incident to Paul Fludd takes interest in the simple properties ol
Lucas the traveller, u,ho ,,vrote about it in his cold, warmth, expansion, density, lightness, in
Voyage au Levant. The final myth is that all their myriad combinations. Surprisingly,
Flamel and Perenelle ritualistically enacted the this rvork was on the Papal Index ol forbidden
alchemical Operation as parr ol their Iile's books.
routine and that they achieved perennial youth Fludd trarrelled on the continent on the
and migrated to Asia. lringe ol the Secret Societies for alternative
education (like Comenius's Academlz 6f
Fludd, Robert (1sT4 1637\ Wisdom). Along u,ith Michael Maier and the
alchemist Joachim Morsius, he sarv the need lor
The Rosicrucian master ol cosmologv. He was new attitudes to education and science. English
'made' by Mattherv Merian, u,hose engrat,ings though he r,vas, his u,orks remained
light up Fludd's convolured History oJ the untranslated into his native tongue, apart from
l,lccrocosm Gnd Mioocosm rvith exquisite his P h i lo s op lt i ca .1.[o s d i ca (cabalistic theoryr 6f
clarit"tr. Genesis). lr wasn't until 1782 that Adam Booz
He was not so much an alchemist as a translated his Trcctdtus ApologeticLts into
theosophist like .[akob Boehme. His output uras German, and even in the tu,entieth century,
phenomenal, his vision traditional. This excluding the unreliable analysis of Dr Craven.
modest man lrom Bearsred, Kent, codilied a commentaries on Fludd are few. See also Booz:
system ol the universe and man's position in it I,laier; Zeroiin.
according to the Neoplatonic hierarchical
structure ol rhe elemental rvorld, the celestial Flying slave
rvorld, the supercelestial r,vorld. God l,vas in his
place, and breathed on chaos to lorm matter, Quicksilr,er. Things with wings symbolize
the elements, man, the animals and minerals. fl1,ing, or the volatile; things rvingless
Being at the mercy ol lames I lor support, s1'mbolize the lixed.
Fludd Christianized the hierarchies ol angels,
as Dionvsius the Areopagire had done. Having Flmbum
Rosicrucian sympathies, Fludd rvas in line u,ith
Paracelsans like Croll, although he had ro The Chinese version of the eternal and
deiend himself over his beliels in the rveapon indivisible principle in all things, rvirhout
salve and less than orthodox remedies. before colour, shape or form. When one has
being accepted into the London College of discor,ered the elixir ol lile. one can reach this
Phl,sicians. state of beliel.
His Utriusqu€ Cosml lfaioris is part theory
of macro- and microcosm and part practical
handbook. The theory depends on quorations
lrom the Ancients, t-he Pimdnder (in Ficino's The prime matter essential lor translormation
1463 translation), Boethius and Campanella. in the animal kingdom, including minerals,
He uses quotations to explain, not to ciutter, as metals and plants. Paracelsus adds: 'lt is an
Burton does in his bulging,4natony oJ alchemist in the stomach \vho digests the lood
Melanchof . There is a charm about his style. consumed by the mouth ol man and other
On the practical 1etel, he invites experiments ro animals.'

72
 Fulcane llt -
FE.W-:-
.,,r!_--,,,.,"_
',:- '._.."'.1 )
Fox Full of spite and anger at his failures in
c'-'ri-l-:.:")

Germany, yet lull of intellectual and occult

According to Chinese folklore, foxes can
yearnings, this is the man u,ho founded Naples
cultivate the Elixir of Life, and can transtbrm
University in 1191 and tvho lostered that
lhemselves inro human beings.
alchemical adventurer Michael Scot
(1175-1255) in Sicily at his chimerical courr of
polyglots and sages.

-F1::..u-r,o1"
The mystical lreemasons turned to ancient
Egrpt for inspiration. Masonic history is vague,
perhaps intentionalll.to create an ambience
of
mythological origins in the building ol the
pyramids or Solomon's Temple.
Many alchemists were sympathetic to
I iox transrnogrif'ving freemasons rvho lvorked on cathedrals and
into a man.
other important buildings in medieval Europe.

I1:l:': Di:il:li: Ald,"_^:

!,
u:?-:,
?:)
A mystical German lollower of
lakob Boehme
rvho designed a series of alchemical mandalas
for contemplation. In the tradition ol Stolcius,
X,Iylius and Vaughan, Freher,s emblem_books
were never published until Adam Mclean
undertook in 19g4 to reproduce the
Pa radox[ ca I E n tgm a t t ca I a ntl Ht erog typ h ic
Emblems.

uls"-s,:1

An odd word for odd people, conjuring up

uTd:TIll pictures ol Brising-like gnomes lorging
!1,,n.!??r) metals
in the borvels ol the earth. Said to be the
Knorvn as Stupor Mundi, the hall
owners olvast mlnes in Hungary or, less
Hohenstaulen, hall Sicilian Emperor of the -
romantically, the family of Sr,viss bankers _
Romans, of Germany and ol Sicilv. Here is
not lvhere Paracelsus \\ras sent by his teacher the
Lhe space ro indulge in rhe rvhls
and Abbot Trithemius ro learn the practical art of
,,vherefores of
this calamitous, berraved transmuting metals. Various ramilications of
monarch, r,lho had his thumb amputated
at the Fugger turn up in the rich metallilerous
joint as an example to his court,
and r,r,ho shut mounrains ol Rudolph,s Bohemia.
a man in a box to die to see il his soul would
come out through a hole in the lid, and u,ho
crowned himself at .[erusalem u,hen the pope
u'1:ii.1ll
excommunicated him for siding l,r,ith the
The alchemical name ol an unidentillable
[,luslims.
trventieth-centuryr alchemist, rvho is clouded in
Fulcane lli

rather unpleasanl m\/stery. Trvo superb books made ol either Aor or Fulcanelli being present.
are r,vritten in his name, erren though they may Aesthetically speaking, Schr,l,aller came out
have been lilted rvholesale from someone else's oi the stable oi the poet Oscar \,'. de Lubicz
research. The someone else is Ren6 A. Milan, nho endor,ved him rvith his name; but
Schr,valler de Lubicz (b. 1887), himsell a there u,as something nasty in the stable. Alter
tascinating character, a briliiant Eryptologist World War I the stable rvas associated rvith the
and Hermeticist. \,Vith him the Fulcanelli tale Hitler Group, called Les \reilleurs (The Lookout
begins. Men, in the sense olvigilantes). Ren6
Schwaller de Lubicz was the bright young Schu,aller, tbr all his noble cullure, lr,as
son of a chemist, drar,vn both to Egyptologv actively and politically anti-lewish. Maybe he
and alchemy. Some time before World \,Var 1, he rvas attracted to the Brothers ol Heliopolis
came to Paris. 1l appears that he encountered because Fulcanelli kneu, the alchemical secrets
rhe sinister Brothers ol Heliopolis, ',l hich u,ere oI atomic bomb-making. The ston norv locuses
organized by the painrer f ean-lulien on J.f . Champagne, one ol the 'possibles' lor the
Champagne, rhe u,riter Pierre Dujols, Gaston 161e ol Fulcanelli.
Sauvage, the alchemist Canseliet and the From January 1925, Cansellet and f.l.
mvsterious Fulcanelli. Fulcanelli exacted an Champagne lived as blood-brothers in a sixth-
oath ol secrecy lrom Schwaller, nou, re-named floor garret at 59 Rue Rochechouart, Paris.
'Aor' (Light), belore telling him rhat the group Champagne r,las a sickly, leprous alcoholic. But
rvas lounded on his, Fulcanelli's, ideas. he spouted ideas that u,ere later to appear in
Fulcanelli then shor,led Aor an alchemical Fulcanelli's books, and he spoke in the cant or
manuscript that he had
remor,ed lrom Chacornac's
\lorship ol Baphomet,the
bookshop rvhere he rvorked
bisexual Satanic god
and asked lor an
interpretation. Aor lound out
that it \\,as similar in st;'le to
Cyliani's Hermes Unveiled ol
the 1830s.
Accordingly. on the basis
ol Aor's understanding ol the
manuscripr, Fulcanelli made
the 'red pou,der', and an
experiment u,as perfbrmed in
1914 projecting it on ro lead
to make gold. Canseliet writes
in a letter to Jacques Sadoul
that it was he r,vho carried out
the experiment in his little
laborarory ar rhe lacron in
the (nolv disused) gas-rvorks
at Sarcelles, with two other
rvitnesses:'.fean-Julien
Champagne, rvho died in
1932, and Gaston Sau\,age,
rvho is to the best of my belief
sti11 alive.' No mention is

74
 x
ffi-9=--,:*-
Fulcane/lt
H.W: -i

argot to which Fulcanelli refers. He lived in

hermaphrodite is redolent of Aleister Cror,vlev,
Y',. .,
abject poverty, experimenting passionately
the Black Magician, rather than of any
u'ith alchemical retorts on his small kitchen Hermetic ideal.
stove. He never went out, yet he received a
Whoever Fulcanelli was, it was rumoured
handsome monthly pension from an unknown
thatAor invited a,Fulcanelli,, in 1931. to his
benefactor (could rhis be Aor subsidizing his
nelv laboratory in Grasse to perlorm a second
alcohol and his alchemy?). Canseliet r,lorked at
experiment. How could Fulcanelli be
.[.J.
the National Library, doing the research fbr
the Champagne, il]..1.
trvo books lvhich rvere coming up for - rhen near death - never left
his garret?
publication.
This time Aor strrore Fulcanelli to secrecy: he
Meanwhile, Aor had been researching held rhe knorvledge ol nuclear lission.
Gothic cathedral symbolism and had prirrately
Although they did apparenrly perform the
Ient his manuscript ro Fulcanelli lor appraisal.
lAagnum Opus, according to Aor, Fulcanelli
Fulcanelli returned Aor,s material, advising
died immediarely afterrvard in agony, but
him not to publish it, as it was too explicit lor handing to Aor the same manuscript he had
the Hermetic code of secrecy. Aor accepted
obtained lrom the bookshop years before.
Fulcanelli's advice. He wenr to Sr,vitzerland to
Parallel to this, back in the paris attic, is the
set up an esoteric community.
other srory: that in 1932, j.J. Champagne dled a
Imagine hls reaction when Le l,tystire cles
hideous death correred in abscesses and pus.
Cathddrales appeared in 1926, containing all through having betrayed the Brothers r,l ith his
-\or's ideas on alchemy in the Gothic, published Lucifer. Canseliet tended his grave in the
bv Schemit in paris and signed ,Fulcanelli,l
cemerery ol Villiers-le-Bel ultra-carelully.
And two years later the book was follor,l,ed by a
Notwithstanding the grave and its contents,
tome twice the size: Les Dem€ures
legend is littered with visits bv Grear Ones
Philosophales et le Symbolisme Hermdtiqtc
incognito. Jacques Bergier is convinced that the
tlans ses Rapports avec l'Art Sacrc et
stranger u,ho visited him in 19JZ u,as
I'Esotlrtsme du Grand Oeuvre. These two books
Fulcanelli, and that Fulcanelli,s real alchemy
rvere acclaimed as the work of a master on
a \\ras as an 'obsener' in a ,field of lorces, u,here
level with Eirenaeus. It r,vas Canseliet r,vho
he had access to 'realities that space and time,
arranged for the publication and he r,lho drerv
matter and ener$/ normalll, conceal lrom us'.
the royalties on them saying, ,The author ol After the War, says Bergier, Fulcanelli
this book has for a long time not been among
became a I,vanted man. He held the secrets of
us. The man himsellhas laded out; onlv his
nuclear bombs and atomic force-lields. He tvas
rvork survives ...'Aor was physicaliy
never tracked dor,r,n by the American CIA,
dissociating himself lrom the Brorhers:
1..J. was lvhich hunted him. The very secrecy that is so
caught up with a Luciferian Society he had
noble in alchemy, allorvs lor the very lraud that
lormed in Saint-Merryr. He had designed a
is so ignominious. ,What is truth? said jesting
Baphomet for the meeting room r,yhere the
Pilate; and would not stay lor an ans\ver.'
Black Mass r,yas held. This revolting
 Summaria Alexqndrinorum, while Hunayn and
other Sluriac Neslorians conve\red into ArabiC
his ideas on intelligent purpose and design,
which so challenged Rhazes inhis Dubitat[ones
ln Gqlenum; Averroes inhis Kulltlyctr (Colliget),
Gabriel and Maimonides in his 25th Book oJ
Aphorisms.ln England, Thomas Linacre, Henry
The archangel, rvho according to the Zohcr, is
VIII's Physician, translated six of Galen's
the guardian of gold, rl,hile N,{ichael guards
r,lorks. His phy5ig 11,s5 interpreted traditionally,
silver.
every decision being governed by the almanac,
John Dee's visionary guide and 'A,ledicina r'vhether blood-letting or curing by zodiacal
Dei' u,as Gabriel, dispenser ol the medicine of
talismans pinned to the body. The stars had to
God, which is variousll, designated as dew or
be considered: 'con' (with) + 'sidera' (the stars)
'r,irtu' (essence). In Dee's seances, Gabriel : 'rvith the stars'.
sometimes appeared dressed in a r,vhite gor'vn
This is no doubt lvhat Ficino (fifteenth-
and bearing a Grail-cup. In one session, 'he
century inspirer of the Hermetic Renaissance
sher,ved a Tree, and a great deale ol water at
r'vith his P[mander translation) rvas relerring to
the roote'. The rvater rose up the tree, which
in his book on astral magic, De Trlplici Vita
su,elled and bore fruit: 'great, layre and red'.
lvhen your body is depressed (too much Saturn)
Gabriel rold Dee that he ate it himsell and that
gi,,e it a bit of ;oviality (Jove). Drau, dorvn
'it lighteneth the harts of those that are
Jove's influences by pinning a picture of Jove's
chosen'.
magic square on the wall. See also Erra-Pater;
Jupiter; Physic; Pimander; Planels; Zodiac.
Galen (,ro129 199)
Galen, alter a detail on
GatY:
the lrontispiece of
A Greek physician-philosopher. The tale goes
Guiilemeau's ,4naromy that Esclepius, god oi healing, appeared to Exile or persecution. The rvord is lound in
(Paris. 1586). Galen's lather in a dream, asking him to have Kabbalistic norks, like the Zohar, to reler to
his son trained as a physician. That is rvhat he Jeuts.
did. The young Galen received his education in
the Eastern provinces of the Roman Empire, Gassendi, Pierre (1592-1 655)
Alexandria and Rome. Around 159, he had the
job ol stitching up slashed gladiators; thus he A philosopher and arch-sceptic. Tales abound
learned practical anatomy. ln 164 he became of John Dee's scryer, Edu,ard Kelley,
Court Physician lor a rvhile to trtarcus Aurelius, transmuting the Stone all or,er Bohemia alter
the Philosopher-Emperor in Rome (',vhom some Dee's departure on 11 March 1588. Gassendi
say was converted ro Judaism by Rabbi 'Prince' has been cited as witness to Kelley's projections
Iudah). at the House ol Tadeus Hajek, lmperial
Galen rvrote copiousiy, not only on animal Physician in Prague.
experiments on the spinal cord, on bod1, fluids, Gassendl wrote dismissively in Latin of
on the pulse and on diet, but also on ancient quacks and forgers of alchemical literature and
Greek Comedy, on Plato, Aristotle, Music, a line or two on Kelle1,, u,ho 'infused a single
Philosophy and Grammar. He believed in a tiniest litt1e drop olvery very red liquid on to a
God-ordained universe, rvhich kept him in rvith pound ol mercury converted into gold' with
the Chrisrians, and popular throughout the trace results.
Middle Ages. His Sixteen Books were gathered But although Kelley may have been
by early Alexandrian alchemists into the pro jectin.qregularly up to X,{ay 1 5 9 1 , Gassendi

76
 G€oltlc
't .,,

t-. -,, / -l t

Lizard. from Gesnet's H[storide

Anlmalium (1551 8Z).

.5 inlirmities of body or soul,

lor instance, 'decrepit old
age' or 'a brain repleat with
many Fumosities' (from
Richard Russell's
translation in 16TB of The
I,4torks oJGeber, th€ _Most
was not born unril 22 January 1592;his
De Famous Arab[an prince and philosopher).It
Rebus Terrestris Inantmis containing his
answers the Schoolmen r,vho object ro alchemy:
caustic comments on alchemlr \,vas not
published unril 1658 (posthumously). Nature perfects metals in a thousand years:
It is
inconceivable that the poor French b01., but hor,v can you in your artifice of
n.,11.,
a',vay in Proyence, would have witnessed transmutation live a thousand years, seeing
Kellev
,l ho. ar a pinch ot-Rudolph II.s snull mighL that you can scarcely extend your lile to a
srill jusr have been alive in 1592) or naa hundred? Ansr,ver is made: \,Vhat nature
ine
menlal nous, aged five, to comment on his cannot perfect in a very long space ol time,
transmutations. that we compleat a short space by our
It is even less likely rhar rhe mysterious artifice; for art can in many things supply
'Gassendi' relers to the physician the delect ol Narure.
Konrad von
Gesner, Su,iss ,monster, of encyclopedantry,
nho (although he had met Dee in 156J) was
rvell and rruly dead by I5o5. in rvhich G.:mm1 Ansl1:::3
plague snufled him out in action,
-
vear rhe
u, i, r".r.,
{11:'lol:'l:,.r
with his patients. Rudolph II's prize exhibit in his court Lapidary
See also Kelle\,: Scner.
of precious stones and rock crystals, talismans
and glyptics. Supposedly, the Gemma Augustea
celer-
rvas imbued rvith occult powers, but actually
it
A composite, not an indit,idual, alchemist: rvas stolen goods. Smuggled from paris in
a
1 5I 1 , ir u,as boughr
medieval Corpus.largely collected in the by one ol Rudolph,s
minds
of Latin scholars and coming to rest in the dealers, David von Bnissel, and delivered to
Bibllothecq Chemicq Curiosa of Manget in this bedazzled emperor in prague, whose
1702.
Geber, not to be confused lvith the real obsession with miracie cures from gemstones
Jabir ibn and alchemy was equalled by his obsession
Ha),yam, elghth-century alchemist at the
court
in Baghdad of Harun ar-Rashid, amassed with his illnesses, bequeathed to him, perhaps,
a
huge body of lirerature in his name: The bv his certified-schizoid mother. See also
Book
oJ 1 12 , The Book oJ Seveng,(translated Rudolph II; \iVunderkammern.
into
Latin by Gerard of Cremona in the tll,elfth
cenilry/), The Book oJMrcy and the Summa
Pertbcilonis, nhich turned up in the pret[osq .9::li:itlTl:::li,"l
llctrgaretq Novelld anthology of 1557.
The adjective from the Hebrerv ,Gaon,,
The Summa contains excellent working excellencyt used in the context ol Geonic
descriptions of the chief practical Operarions
of literarure, or Geonic period in the history of the
alchemy and ofnature, and the use of
lews in Babylon (589-1038).
apparatus. It also details the impediments in
The Geonim rvere the Elders of the two great
the rvay of a disciple of alchem;., rvhich
may be Babl,lonian ervish Academies established at
.f
Ghcuct (tl-hdktm

Sura and Pumbeditha in .10589. Their iob rvas

to carry on the interprelations ol the Talmud
9t'1:-l
that had recently been edited (500-5BB) b)" the In its more sticky form, one of the symbols ol
Saboraim ol Babylonia. Mercury, which is 'mother ol minerals and
Some astonishing alchemical Kabbalistic metals and their lirst matter'.
books arose in the Geonic period. one was
Shi'ur Komcrh, a treatise on the bodily
Gnostics
dimensions ol God; another \\ras the Sepher
Yetzirah (Book ol Creation).
Adherents of a semi-Christian laith originating
in Eg,pt and rooted in magico-alchemical
Ghayat al-hakim (The Final Aim oJthe traditions. They relused to accept that God had
made this r,vicked world and settled in
:hit:::!h"')
Byzantium in the early'Christian era.
A book ascribed to the tenth-century Spanish
Their various sects were expelled lrom
Arabian. Maslama ibn Ahmad. Translated into
Christendom lor rheir dualistic belief that the
Latin and Castlllian as the Pic(Itr[x, it',vas
visible u,orld was created not by God but by the
universally circulated in the medieval occult
Demi-Urge, a type of angel a good r,vay down
rvorld, u,ith its m6lange ol incantations lrom
the ladder benveen God and created beings.
all manner of sources, including Persian,
Hebrerv and Greek.
Surprisingly little has been made ol this o"::i:
handbook that no angel-coniurer could be
rvithoutl De-m1,stily Pico, Ficino, Trithemius. 'Necromantic', 'spe11-binding', one of the
Cornelius Agrippa ir,rrho used ir in spite ol suggested origins of 'Gothic', along r,vith
ollicial rvarnings not to) ol their 'astral magic' 'argotique' (cant or secret alchemical language,
and it comes down to the Picatrix. used by the sailors oi the ship ,4rgo), 'art
Even Rudolph ll in Prague had one ol his gothique', and 'goatique' ('Ar-Goat' in Celtic is
necromantic stooges chant snippets lrom it at 'country ol trees' and in all Celtic languages
his usurping brother Matthias. Whater,er the trees mean letters).
ellicacy of the Pican'ix, truth it is that seven Druidic colleges were lounded in rvoods,
years to the day alter N,latthias seized and Gothic cathedrals are on Druidic sites. The
Rudolph's crorvn in 1612, he got his come- r,aults close over like trees, and take us back to
uppance: his Iieutenants rvere defenestrated the 'envo0tement', 'envoluting' or magical
lrom the Chancery windou,s by the populace po.,ver of 'goetic'.
and overthrorvn. See also Cornelius Agrippa;
Dee; Arlaslama ibn Ahmad al-Mairiti; Picatrix;
Rudolph IIr Trithemius. Gold

cibberlsh The only perf'ect metal with all parts in balance,

r,vith equal proportions of Sulphur, Salt and
That this rvord has come to mean 'twaddle' Mercury. Symbol ol transforming man and
reflects ironically on the annals ol alchemy. nature, gold the highest aspiration of
"vas
The r,l,ord is derived, r,ia garbled paths, irom medieval alchemists, but, say they darkly,
both 'Geber', the composite alchemist, and 'aurum nostrum non est aurum vulgi' (our gold
'gharbala', Arabic for 'to silt the line lrom the is not the gold ol the common herd). The male
coarse', a description ofrvhat alchemists are principle in the prlma materid. See also
supposed to do. Philosophic Mercury, Salt and Sulphur.

78
 -'4*
H* r€
Gotcm
kq

/-\
\?

The atomic composition

olsold, as seen in
trance bv Annie Besant
and colleagues.

o:l:,,
The Hebrer,v lvord 'golem' is found only 6nss
An artiliciallr,-creared being. The Kabbalistic in the Old Testament, r,r,here it means ,human
alchemists urere fascinated b1,the idea ol embrvo'. In Jervish midrashim (commentaries)
creating lile alchemicall1,', u,ithout the help ol 'golem' came ro be applied ro an artilicially
\vomen. Alter all, El,e rvas pan ol qlipoth, rhe created being, a homunculus; usually, but not
sinlul u,orld. \Vas not Adam made by God of alr,r,ays, dumb and sometimes intelligent, and
cla1,, ol 'kemi', printtt mcrteria? alrvays possessed of great physical stren.qth.
 _--=vm Grecttrakes. l/alantlne

, . .':.,ry
The legendary golem is made ol clay by a The adept, at the end of an advanced stage
u,onder-worker (alchemist, potter, metallurgist, along his mystical path to enlightenment,
magus) and endorved r'vith life by the n ord of would make a foetus-figure from clay and bury
por,ver, Emeth, and returned to clay by the r,vord it in the earth, the 'kemi', Adamic soi1, or he
Meth, or 'death'. Meth was used rvhen the might lorm a manikin lrom virgin soil. Then he
golem became so strong rhat it threatened its rvould rvalk round it clockr,l,ise, chanting
maker. various magical lormulae of number-and-letter
There are various tales ol golems that hark combinations derived from the Sepher yetzirah.
back to the lifle-giving rituals of certain Jer,vish This endor,ved the creature with symbolic lile,
alchemisrs and sages in Prague and Spain r,vhich could later be taken alvay by a
during the Middle Ages. One such golem was widdershins r,valk round the site of the
supposedly made by Rabbi Judah Loe'nv ol manikin. These rituals u,ere combinations ol
Prague in the sixteenth century. There nrere the adept's advanced progress torvards God.
certain t\,velfth- and thirteenth-century
Kabbalistic alchemists rvho lollorved ritualistl- Greatrakes, Valentine
callv the text of the Sepher Yetzlrah (The Book $r
ol Crearion) in rvhich life is conlerred upon a i:'-':"T:l:h ::T:?-i
clay puppet. An Irishman, lamed throughout England lor :ti

his curatir,e po\\rers and laying on olhands,

rvhich his gratelul clients witnessed as some
Golem or homunculus
kind of alchemical transmutation rvithin their
rheumatickl'bones. Valentine rvas able to get a
patienr ro stretch out his arm and keep it still
for hours under his hypnotizing and healing
rl
hands. ,it
F
i
{
i
*,
1,

&

#
,.fl

't
il
tr

i
*
1:
ti
,4.

\Ialentine Greatrakes
Ial,ing on ol hands

80
 Gymnosophists

His detractors called him an impostor, who became Master of the Schools, and Lecturer to
pretended to cure all diseases by stroking his the newly arrived Dominican and Franciscan
patients. He occasioned very warm disputes in friars. For a bishop, he was slightly
lreland in 1665, and in England in 1666 ,on unorthodox, being an ardent lollower ol
his examination belore the Roval Societv,. Dionysius the Areopagite.

oii':il: Gr:iTil :llrylrT

ii ?, 1 .,u!!)
-\ book of magical spells; anything lrom the The son of one of Rudolph II,s physicians,
-\lacbethian 'eye of nelvt, and toe ol frog' Guarinoni brought up by Jesuits in prague. He
Variety to the much more sinister invocations wrote a giant phantasmagoria of German
to the powers of r,virchcraft used by outpourings on alchemy and moral decline. He
John Dee
and bad popes. Grimful rather than graceful. lnveighed against quacks and the denobling ol
the alchemical science. He dedicated to
Grosseteste, Robert, Bishop of Lincoln Rudolph II his book of supernal size and
ib. 1168, Stradbroke, Suflfolk; d.t2SS Buckden. massive title (here summarizedl) : Die Grewel
nll::l der Vend,iistung Menschlichen Geschlechts
Neben vor- mit- Lrnd nachgehenden so wol
.\ tolerant, lvise, enlightened bishop, who Nattlrlichlen als Christlich- und po/itischen
actively saved groups oflervs from massacre in dqnutder s trettbqren Mitteln.
England. Grosseteste was a major lorce in the
education ol Roger Bacon, and a struggling
student of Hebreo-Arabian philosoph),. He had _Gv'i::'ll.1:1"
a quaint Old Testament consisting ol a literal According to Michael A,laier, an ancient
translation into Latin from the Hebrerv, to help Ethiopian Hermetic brotherhood, forerunner ol
n,ith the Hebrerv grammar. the Rosicrucians, which practised alchemy.
He had a love of classical Greek, rvhich he Whether the sages r,vere naked or the Trurh
introduced into Oxford Universitv, where he rvas, Maier does not elaborate onl
 not come to terms rvith prot'essional medicine.
He questioned methods ol diet and hygiene,
and provided inspired, unorthodox cures,
nhich alienated physicians. He could not
accept Paracelsus because he did nor believe
Hahnemann, Samuel (1755 184J) nature expressed itsell in occult signs. Yet he
lr,as conrrinced ol Paracelsus's 1aw of
The lather ol homeopath,v, b), delault. He rvas similarities and considered practising the law
born at midnight on 10 1 1 August 1755 in alchemically. His great work, The Chrontc
Meissen, urhere his tather had migrated ro rvork Diseases, is deeply pessimistic; Hahnemann
in the local porcelain flactory, lounded by the doubts rhere are any lasting cures lor mankind.
alchemist Johann Boltger. Single-mindedly piecing together research
lrom ancient alchemical. medical and botanical
texts, Hahnemann developed his orvn system
of homeopathy. But he \\ias out on a limb, a
p€tit prlnce lrom another planet - brilliant )ret
bizarre.
He died mocked and unmourned on 2 lull'
1843. Unlike alchemists, Hahnemann relused
to connect healing r,l ith mind or spirit. He
conceived his sl,stem as phvsical the hierarchy
ol plants, animals, people and, bevond these,
oscillations, energies and vibrations. He did
not see the metaphvsical correspondences
between the worlds ol God, gold and sun, and
the rvorld ol mlnerals, plants and man.
Nonetheless, his system ol potencies, rvhich he
insisted on calling 'medicine and science', rvas
really more akin to the higher reaims ol
lungian archetypes.

Ha-nasi, Nay3n re1 amul]

f
A ninth-century Babylonian lerv, u,ho
transmitted the Geonic Kabbalah to Europe, by
conveying his teachings to the lamous
Kalonymides family r,r,hen he emigrated to
Italy. 5sg also Kalonymides.
Male herb and female Hahnemann trained in the Classics and
herb. alter a u,oodcut in earned his living as a translator, a transformer
Hortus Sdnitatis
Helvetius, Johann Friedrich
ol codes. interpreting and potentizing dull n nltl:l
(N,lainz, 1491).
chronicles, and putting energ, into the core io 191f:'"lll:l^:lil:' l'onr'n:
material. The personal phl,sician to the Prince ol orange
He spent his lile trying to establish in the Netherlands. His true name was
credibility as a physical scientist, but had more Schureitzer, rvhich, like the Latin lorm
in common rvith Steiner and Jung, his spiritual 'Helvetius', means 'srviss man'. Suspicious of
successors, than modern medicine. He could alchemy, he kept up a running battle with Sir

82
 Herm

report was published inhis Vltulus Aureus (The

Hague, 1667), and also in Manget's Bibliothectt
Chemica Curiosa (1702). All very plausible;
except that the Vttulus appears in Harley MS
6485, as a letter to John Dee, who was dead by
half a century.

H:!!:y::
A cabalistic interpretation of the Torah,
especially of the Creation, by pico della
Mirandola. The work was published on 9
March 1489, and when the pope objected to it,
o
Pico said it was an aberration of vouth.
c

Kenelm Digby who turned up at the prince,s

court with a 'sympathetic powder,.
Like Van Helmont and Boyle, Helvetius was
another respectable scientist who was visited
Pico della
by a nomadic alchemist. Helvetius, particular
Mirandola
pock-marked stranger tricked and teased him
rvith some specks of transmutatory powder,
coming and going a couple of times - enough
to whet Helvetius' curiosity - before r /L/
(- $
disappearing 'to the Holy Land,. Helvetius and
his wife put the powder to the test: protecting it
in wax before dropping it on an old piece of
lead piping heared in a crucible and finding,
alter lurid colour changes and loud hissings,
"::l1g:!i*:l*
In homeopathy and alchemy, the Law says that
that the piping had all turned ro gold within a the symptoms move from within to without,
quarter of an hour. from above to below, and from time present to
Meticulous records of this alchemical time past, in the reverse order from the one
escapade were kept by Helvetius, including the they established themselves in flirst, in the
testing by the silversmith Brechtil and the diseased body.
Master ol the Mint who, along with other
metal-workers, had to admit that the ,gold'
H::-
made was heavier after their testing than lllti3l:::i3:l
before. lt was the talk of all The Hague. Even Stone pillars - all phallus and head - ol
Spinoza, cynic of cynics, r,vriting to larrig lellis, Hermes, which stood in front of doors and
had to accept Helvetius' evidence. Helvetius, public places in Athens, and r,vere regarded as
 Hermaphrodite

symbolic ol the God's protection. Their ,"rrr:p:li.:

mutilation was thought an act ol terrible
impiety and an omen of disaster. The chiei site ol the cult of Thoth/Hermes in
Eg.vpt. The burial-complex at Hermopolis (the
modern Tuna el-Gebe1) contains the tomb of
H:.rmaphrodlle
Petosiris, High Priest of Thoth. Tunnels of
The son of Hermes and Aphrodite, who u,elded tombs lor the ibises and baboons sacred to
himsell together rvith the rvater-nymph Thoth are still to be tbund beneath the sands.
Salmacis. Alchemically, Hermes undergoes a
sex change as he rises and becomes the volatile
lemaie i\{ercury to conjoin rvith Sulphur (ma1e) ':':":"ll:
in the hermaphrodite. See also Androgyne; The 1irt1e manikin that Paracelsus and others
Rebis. claimed to have made lrom semen and various
metals. The symbol ol translormation lrom
Hermaphrodite non-living to lir,ing. The making ol men from
FLE6MAT
semen or stone was a recurring Freudian
absorption long before Freud.

n:_I"rylP usvl:
:l'il:"::'f ry1
The author ol the fiith-century AD Hieroglyphikc'
u,hich rvas even then one ol the lew surviving
books on the Egvptian hieroglyphics before the
r,vorld they represented rvas submerged in the
Dark Ages. In his name 'Horus', the hawk-
headed Egvptian deity, combines r,vith the Greek
sun-god Apollo, both aspects of Thoth or
Hermes, as god of Magical Arts.
The Hieroglyphika was brought to Italy in
1419 by scholars rvho anticipated the downlall
ol Byzantium and translated it lrom the Greek.
As an interpretation ol the 'sacred letters' the
text became wildl1, popular and acquired
magical signiflcance among Hermeticists, at
lirst in the Florentine School around Cosimo de
t.r_*:r_ Medici, and then all over Europe. The glyphs
became the basis for alchemical emblems and
The one rvho started it all, the u,inged for talismanic names ol porver. osu'ald Croll
messenger ol the gods l,vho flies up and down identilies hieroglyphs as the Sacred Language
through trvo norlds - 'as above, so belorv'. His of Thoth: it is the key to the correspondences of
rvings span Egypto-Hebretv-Greek and Roman the rvorlds ('as above, so below'), but a
occult philosophies. He is the Egyptian Thoth, language we have lost and need to find.
the God ol hieroglyphs or ietters, and his
alphabet metamorphosed into the Jewish Tarot,
while his job identified him n ith lhe Roman ':_pl:o"
neu,sbo), Mercuryr and his quick-as-a-flash Routes used by pilgrims to .ferusalem in the
nature r,r,ith quicksilr,er. crusades, guarded by the Knights Templar.

84
 Humid Path

r-e
/ -\ //
r
,/,<D. t1 \

tt
tt
?-
,ll
,/
<t

/,.'
/ /,/ \)
I

_/'
I

4i
l=---.--.----\( 1 Horus thc guardlan
./L-
(\\i
(\
I

-
F-_.c_ hau,k ar the temple
entrance oi Abu Simbel
E$'pt
2 Horus in the tomb of
Senaiem, a nobieman
5 King Chefren
(2520-2.194BC) deified
lvith Horus
nymi! eatn cut' than Nature's,round-about, roacl to
perfection, for, once purified, Mercur,v can act
The Humtd path or Dtscourse on th€ Vegemble
on everything else and purify it. Along rl,ith
,I,[€nstruum oJ Sdturn b1, Edl,ard Kelley r,l,as
Sulphur and Salt, Mercury inreracts at all levels
probably written in prison near prague c.
r,r,ithin the elements of rhe universe: ,This is the
1592-3. The text $ras dedicated to Rudolph II,
unirrersal sperm ofAnaxagoras, who said that
'the most potent Lord of the Holl,Roman
all things had the same first substance.'
Empire' (in the hope that Rudolph would
As a purifl_ving agent, ordinaryr mercury
release him from prison?). It u,as published
could be used, says Kelley, but rhat rvould take
rvith ttvo other alchemical texts by
lohn Lillv too long. Ideally, mercury that has been
and Meric Casaubon. .lrom a manuscripL,, adds
animated or quickened by lire is needed. ,On11,
Kellev, not conlessing rvhether it rvas his orvn.
vigorous and exuberant Mercurv is really
or from Dee's or Rudolph,s library,..
suitable lor our purpose. Mercury must be lixed
Nonetheless. contained within its 53 pages
b1,means ol its oln inherent sulphur, acted on
is the most lucid narratirre of the u,hat, the whv
bv external heat ... This heat proceeds lrom the
and the how ofalchemv: philosophers have
heavenl.v bodies.' The action ol dillerent
always sought 'a sound mind in a sound bodv,
heavenll,' bodies produces dillerent nerals
which is attainable by the ,royal road, of
:

Saturn governs lead, Jupiter tin, Sun gold,

alchemy. The mind is ,the most celesrial ...
Venus copper and so on.
omniscient part of man, being receptive ol God,
Belore shori ing us horv to prepare this
but the bodv is a 'dungy workshop of lrail
special Mercury, this ,Stone, of A,,lercury, Kelley
clay'. 1n order to reline it, the sage needs to
examines conflicting theories of narrorv_
study hol Nature separates, purifies, then
minded alchemists tvho think .their one little
reconstitutes matter. He must studv .the
branch is the whole tree ol philosophv, and
elements of the human body and ol the
thus have obscured the entire garden of the
universe generally'. Kelley shows ,our Art is no
Hesperides r,vith the fumes of their ignorance'.
Utopian dream', and that is proved by ,the
Then Kelley turns to preparation ol rhe
lnnumerable and stupendous metamorphoses
Stone, the Tincture and potable Gold. His
which Nature daily exhibits'.
language norv involves planetaryr s)rmbolism,
Kelley explains that a common for the alchemist needs a .prolound insight,
denominator lound in all ^ilercury,
metals, is a ,shorter into the correspondences behveen the sublunar
,,:\--ry,-j
((.,- --- ^y.
Huna:ln ibn Ishaq cnd Ishaq lbn Hunayn
,r:)
;
i-'1., !
world ('as below'; and the cosmic ('so above'). and.llagna Moralta. His Ophthalmologt and
See also Kelleyi Rudolph II; i1 Zoppo. translation of Hippocrates's Prognostics form
the basis of the oldest Arabic medical
Hunayn ibn Ishaq (Bo8-873) and encyclopedia that Hunayn's contemporary, al-
Tabari, compiled.
::P::bi "liiv_' !9 ?'9l Hunayn's son, Ishaq, continued his father's
This father and son were, two beacons for a1l translations lrom the Greek into Syriac and
times amongst alchemical translators. The Arabic, and brought out his version of
Syriac Nestorian, Hunayn, not only worked in Arislotle's l\etaphysics , his De Generatione et
Baghdad as physician and court librarian Corruptione, and his immensely popular De
under the enlightened caliph A1 Ma'amun but Anima (Aristotle's three-tier system of the
aiso travelled throughout Syria and Palestine to Soul). Not only this, but the Hunayn team
Alexandria to gain medical knowledge. He translated Plato's Republic, Laws and the
transmitted Galen to the orient, making Timaeus, which was the supreme source of
available Arabic versions that had hitherto only inspiration for alchemists of all later
been in Syriac. He corrected the laulty existing generations. See also Arabic; Aristotle;
Arabic edition of Dioscorides and established Baghdad; Caliphs; Dioscorides; Nestorians;
exact texts without being starkly 1itera1. Svriac.
He translated Aristotle's Cctegories, Physics,
 passions and linal Bliss u,ill be received.
Ficino quores lamblichus, and lohn Dee had
his works in his library, but to many alchemists
the De.Mystertts ,,vas not as lamiliar as the
Plmander and the Escleptus',r,ere. The

li'l1i'|": lb ?1?,!?,i5: ii:gr g.

1,-.j
Mysteries could nor be inlused with Christian
Platonism as could t.he Corpus Hermeticum, so
Pythagorean and mystic alchemist. Educated both Dee and Ficino took the risk ol being
lirst by the visionary Bishop Anatolius of branded as Black Magicians or burned at the
Laodicea, he then moved to Tlrre and Rome stake as Bruno \\,as in their wake. See also
rvhere he studied under porphyry the Bruno; Dee; Esclepius; pimander.
Neoplatonist (himself a pupil of plotinus).
lamblichus turns to the A,lasters themselves lor
first-hand philosophl,' to plato's phGed.o lor l":i::h:*l:1.v
arguments in lavour ol the philosophic lile; to Paracelsus's o,,vn brand of chemotherapl; the
Plato's Republlc lor the Carre of Ideas and the alchemical preparation ol healing remedies,
Xtyth of rhe Sun; and to Aristotle's lost largely inorganic.
Protrepticus for validation ol a lile ol
contemplation. Some ol Iamblichus,s notions
are akin to rhe Gnostic 'evil, of the bod1,t ersus lbimolhic
the 'good' ol rhe unseen spiritual u,orld. In the lorm of an lbis, sacred to Thoth or
For adepts ol ritual Egl,ptian maglc, Hermes.
Iamblichus' most influential rvork, De I,|JSteriis
Aegtptlorum, stands as an ans\,ver to
virtually a rir,al to - Porphl,r;r's Letter to Anebo, lo,:
nhich queries rhe logic and eflicacy ol a sl,stem Thoth, the Egyptian God of Letrers and Sacred Thoth with an ibis
that is magicalll, based. In the De ,40rsterus, Arts, is symbolized as an ibis-headed man and head, cradling the
Iamblichus's otvn version ol the High priest lntimately connected with a number of lunar moon.

Anebo ansrvers the character porphyry's lunctions, cycles ol time, measure and
questions on the nature ol the Egvptian movement. At Hermopolis, Thoth tvas called
priesthood, ol invocations and incanrations. ol the Masrer ol the City ol Eight. the Ogdoad.
initiation through discarnate beings, and the
changing nature ol the initiate receiving
different po\vers iiom the 'otherworlds,. The lbi "1"11 11:?5-12:0)
nhole discourse is remarkabl), like a modern At the age ol eight Ibn Arabi r,vas srudying in
handbook for training in psychic mediumship, Seville all there rvas to knorv about science and
n ith a solid grounding in ll,hat should be all there I'vas to knor,r, about the Koran. He
undertaken through 'mind' (lelt-brain) in travelled widely, learning the secrets ol the
connecting rvith dirrine energies and u,hat could Magi, and the alchemical creat Work in Syria,
be entrusted to outside-time intuition (right- Egrpt, Anatolia and Mecca. He iinally died in
brain). Ultimatel1, the message ol the ),Iysteries Damascus in 1240,1eaving a huge literary
is that r,l,hater,er you put in, so you get out: il output. He is best remembered lor his tu,o
daemons )rou invoke, you lvlll get back energies mystical treatises, a l- Fu tu h c t a I -Ma kk tycr (The
of the physical appetites ,r,ou invoke; ilyou Illeccan Revelation) and Fusus al-htkam (The
inrroke angels, you tune into the levels ol Gems ol\Visdom), which centre on lbn Arabi's
intellectual contemplation; ilyou invoke God, theory ol the Logos, nor rhe four-letter holy
you receive liberarion lrom the r,vorld ol u,ord but the 22 variations on the theme of God

87
 Ibn Wahshtya

His most celebrated 'discoveries' are his

Bock on Babylonlan Astrologr (with its system
of decans) by one Tankalusha (Teucer). He also
wroLe Nabatean Agriculture and a Book oJ
Poisons, probabll, all his orvn rvork, and
certainly all were popular sources lor medieval
alchemical ideas on prime matter and
cosmology.

,i?:u
The licence granted to a Muslim sage ro teach a
given document in his name. It applied to the
r'vandering scholars and alchemists over
Europe, r,vho might acquire anonvmous
manuscripts rvhich they r,lanted to use.

l1t'*lli:i:
A member of an alchemical sect lounded b1,
Dom Pernety in 1.779 and knorvn as the
Illuminated Brotherhood olAvignon.

A likeness oi
tr{ohammed u,ith his
srvord of victory.

in the Universe, God or the Universe, God

equals the Universe. Mystically rhe Logos
expresses the reality ol A,{ohammed. Each
prophet is a Logos, but Mohammedis the
Logos. Mohammed is the cosmic principle. He
is the Perfect Man (al-tnsan al-kamil), a theme
popular r,vith Algazel. Ibn Arabi had already
r,vritten on this same theme. He speculates on
the essence of the Perlect Man: body, spirit,
wisdom, his part in the universe, his nature as
the mirror ol God. See also Algazel; Damascus.

ll-"io'11I1 llluminatio alchemical s1,mbo1 lor psl,chic rebirth.

A tenth-century Babl,lonian agriculfuralist and

celebrated collector ol'ancient' manuscripts t,.hot.! 7
and alphabets. He pretended to have discovered \2 :1 .."11"ry ::l
a mass ol alchemical writings by the ancient ln Egrptian m1,th, the deilied architect olKing
Babylonians, ancestors of his own race, the Zoser ol the Third Dynasty (reigned 2630 2611
Nabateans, rvho rvere culturally superior to the nc), lamous lor his Step Pyramid. He was the
Arabs. patron of science and medicine and has been

88
 j

Katrou(tt
H :-:
/..,((( A S,-FJ
fI:.\
i\u

identilied with Esclepius, and il irh one ol

the recognize the rrue non-existence ofhis laculties
Memphis triad: the son olptah and Nut. He is
of thought.'
celebrated as the prototype ol creative genius.
Some say he u,as the inspiration lor the
brotherhoods ol alchemist-masons of Gothic l:_:i'
cathedrals.
In Alexandrian alchem1,, the lourth and linal
process in the production ol the Stone, u,herebv
r19iso the metals change both their colour and their
substance. The first stage is melanosis the
Grey-violet. rvhich, according to Aristotle,
is the blackening, rhe producing ol the black metal
emblematic colour lor mercun/, and the colour
from the prima materia; the second stage is
ol the St Christopher at Notre-Dame in paris.
leukosis, the \vhitening or silvering (changine Toledor a detail ol a
.Just as mercun,is the odd one out ol the serren to silver\ ot rhe meral: rhe rhird is xanrhosls, svnasogue u,ith Hebretv
primary alchemical metals (goid. sih,er, and Arabic inscriptions.
copper, the 1,slls11r1nt or golding; the last is iosis, the
tin, iron, lead - and mercury), so indigo is the purpling or spiritualizing of the metal. so that
It rYas deserted after rhe
odd one out of the colours, being neither Expulsior.r of the fer,r,s in
a there is little. ilany, ,bod1,, |s;1. The more 1492. until rhe
primaryr nor a secondary colour.
intense the colour, rhe more tull ol ,spirit, the Christians took it over
A,lercury, and indigo have parallel positions:
metal and the less of ,bodr,'. so the more power in the lollou,ing
mercury as the source ol all the prima6, century'. It has re mained
it has as transmutatory Stone. This alchemical
merals: indigo (represenring \\,hire light) in use as a church ever
as the Stone l,r,as thought of as alchenical sperm.
source of the prismatic colours. sincc.

ll1ul:ftion
The KGB of lormer times, the Inquisirion n,as
unalloyed erril, the Hound oi Hell, hunter oi
alchemists, tracker and liquidator of anvone
guiltl, ol pracrising the ,Magical Sciences,,
n hether the Cathars in Toulouse in 1 1 79
or
Bruno in \ enice in 1600.
In Spain, the Inquisition tribunals srarted
fbrmally in 1458 under Ferdinand and lsabella.
in rhe shador,l olTom6s de Torquemada, the
tirst Inquisitor-General. But in efflect,
persecution ol this or that unorthodox group
had been happening lor centuries, particuiarly
the galur of f ervs alter the sack ol A,tuslim
Toledo in 1085 by the Christians. See also
Bruno; Galuti Stake.

lili':1-k"'il tsalc or Ka,.o-"11

i::
u:l_rl.l
The initiate or enlightened man; rhe aichemist
The first ol the posr-biblical
r,lho has arrived, r,,,,ho has transmuted dross to Jervish
philosophers',vho culmi nated l,vith Xilaimonides
gold. In the r,lords olIsmael Hakki Burser,,i:
in the nlelfth cenrun,. Isaac trained in the
'The iniriate, rhe saint, the insan,i_kamil,
is he magical desert-complex ol Kairouan (in
u,ho possesses the laculty ol being able to
Tunisia) belore trarrelling to Alexandria and
Isadc tlte Hollantler

probabll,lurther alield, practising as an enamels and artilicial gemstones. The treatise

alchemist-phy'sician. centres on the art of'extracting dead and
He \vas of enormous influence on later impure metals into true Sol et Luna'. Their {
thinkers ol the maior monotheistic religions: 'saturn as the First Matter' is probably I
j
Muslim, Jerv and Chrisrian. He particularly Philosophical Lead, although the details as to
inspired Gerard ol Cremona (1114-81), that rvhat their 'De Triplici Ordine Elixiris et Lapidis
inrreterate translator ol scientilic and Theoria' or their 'Libe11i Secretissimi' might be
alchemical u,orks (from Italian and Latin to are obscure.
Castillian, Arabic, and Hebrenr); Albertus Bernard ol Trer,isa is said to be a
N{agnlrsi Siger ol Brabant; Nttaimonides; and contempor)'ol the lsaacs, u'ho perlormed their
Nicholas ol Cusa; and influenced, even il Magna opera successlulll' and successirrely,
negativel),, Thomas i\quinas. u,hile Bernard rvas lvorriting for the Stone all
lsaac rrrrote on the Elemenrs, an exposition his lile. Paracelsus is supposed to hal'e derived
ol Aristotelian ph1'sics, and a Book oJ Soul and his principle of Salt lrom the Isaacs.
Spr)zr. rvhich contains rhe Kabbalistic notion ol The Opera llineralio appears in Theatrum
God's emanations or 'splendours'' the lirst Chentlcum \iolume I11, edited by Zetznet at
'splendour' creates the Rational Soul; lrom its Ursel (1602). See also Bernard ol Trevisa;
emanation comes the second 'splendour' giving Geber: Lion.
rise to the Vegetative Soul; and lrom that
develops the material rvorld. Bi:r:f :l t":r,,: i::9-:11
lsidor::
Isaac the Hollander Hugelf influential among scholar-alchemists in
Spain. France, Ital1', and then Germany alter
inl':'1:n :'illiil his rvorks burst lnto print in Augsburg in 1472'
Isaac and his son u,ere foilotvers ol Geber. Isidore did more than an"ve11s else in his era to
nhose alchemical experiments are said to be sar.e ancient knor,vledge that was beginning to
amongst the most explicit in the r,vhole range disappear lrom the \,\rest. In the monastic
ol Hermetic literature. Their lives u'ere buried tradition ol Cassiodorus belore him, he
in the obscuritv necessary to adepts; they spent synthesized, collated and classilied a huge
their u,hole time in the laboratory. quoting no- amount oi learning into his encyclopedia, the
one later ihan Arnold Villanova. Apparentll' Originwn sive Erymologiarwn. vthich rvas said
they nrere acquainted rvith 'aqua iortis' and to contain plans lor a complete medieval
'aqua regia' (ro1'al urater), rvhich u'ere universit).' system.
discor,ered in the lourteenlh century. Isidore is lull ol naive curiosity about the
Thel'allirmed that the Grand l,lagisterium origins ol language, particularly Hebrell' and
(transmuting agent) would convert a million sacred alphabets (he personally rvas restricted
times its olr,n r,r,eight into gold and that those to Sl Ambrose and St.Jerome); the origins of
nho took a small portion ol the Philosophical geometry in the Nile delta; the nature ol prime
Stone n eekly rvould be presen'ed in perlect matter and Aristotle's theory ol the lour
health to the last hour assigned to each b1'God. elements, metals, alloys and mining.
This is just i,l,hat the Geber Corpus claimed, The marvellous thing about his rvorks is the
according to A.E. \\raite, and no other lile lsidore inluses into his diagrams u'ith
alchemists have established the transmuting which he explores Natural Science. He sees
capabilities of lhe Stone on such a large scale. metals as having a lile ol their orvn; having
The Opera lllneralicr or De LaPide been tbrmed from vapours and coagulated rvith
Phrlosophico b1' Isaac sholt's that thel' u'orked earth, thev harre a grorvth and a death. His
in metals and understood the manulacture ol cosmologr and his elements are organic.

90
 interlinking macro- and microcosm ,as it urere,
by arms' (quasi quibusdam duobus brcchtts).
His medical r,visdom influenced Gundisalvus,
the great nveltth-century Spanish churchman
and accessor of Arablc and Latin alchemical
texts. His encyclopedic scope impressed
Bartholomew (and his editor Batman), rvhile his
visual conception ol the inrer-changeability of
the elements seized the imaginarion ol
Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1530_9J) and Mannerisr
painters.
Transmogrilied by the alchemical minds ol
ihe Renaissance, lsidore's E6tzrn ologiae
appeared in print in 1472 and ran to at least
ten editions in the next century, r,yhile his De
Naturd Rentm was also printed in l4T2 as De
Responsione Mundi et de Asttorum Ordrnqtione
rvith his sketches translormed into r,loodcuts.
See also Batman.

':_i:
The mother, rvife and sister of the Egvptian
gods. She is the Moon-goddess, r,r,hose
conjunction urith Osiris, the Sun-god, gives rise The Four Elements. after a rvoodcut in lsidore,s ra
s lone,IIundl
Res pon
to all things. \l 172).
In alchemical symbolism, phiiosophic
i\,lercury u,as disguised as Isis. Luna,
eueen,
Sister, Eagle, Serpent and \\ringed Dragon. I"l1
The ixir or el-ixir, Tincture or alchemical Stone.

,,yw
Iry-
The Eg,ptian city olRa, the Sun Culr. In Greek. The lVhlrlers or the 'setters-up,in the Gnostic
IWNW.,vas Heliopolis, norv a suburb of Cairo. three-stage process of Creation. The Iynxes rvere
Hermetic texrs repeatedly refer to this perfect the first whirlings our of Chaos; the Synoches
city as an ideal model for the uniterse or a \vere rhe 'holdings-together, in Graviry; and the
heliocentric system of planets. Campanella Teletarchae were the'perlecrings' or rhe Created
based his Ciry ol the Sun on this Utopia. Form. See also Gnostics.
 against background of Shi-ite loyalists and
powermonger r,iziers around the caliph, jabir
did become alchemist, in the newly founded
Baghdad, at the court of the Abbasid Harun ar-
Rashid, for',vhom he rvrote The Book oJVenus
fabir ibn Hayyan (c. 221-B1s) on the Noble Art olAlchemy. He r,rras
responsible lor importing many scientific Greek
Olten conlused u,ith Geber, the composite manuscripts lrom Byzantium, and his olvn
creation ol the medier,al mind. The more-or-less output was prodigious. Among his papers,
real labir rvas knotvn variously as al-Sufi ithe listed by his bibiiographer lbn al-Nadim, are
X,{ystic), aL-Kuli (the man from Kufla, a'neu,' topics as diverse as astronomical tables,
to\\rn' on the banks ol the Euphrates, where he commentaries on Euclid and Ptolemy's
certainly,spent some rime) and al-Tusi (the Alntagest. on miliran engines. magic squares.
man tiom Tus in Khorasan). and logic. One olhis books, Kitqb crl-bdhth (of
\Vhatever.fabir's intrigulng and intrigued- nhich manv passages rvere incorporated into
the Ptccttrix.\, explores talismans and astral
empowerment, linking (in alchemical minds)
a o with lamblichus's Eg,tptian Mysteries and the
OO Esclepius . His Boo,ts oJ Balances struggle to
a a ooo o o juggle with numbers and letters to find a

a
O' formula for balancing all the components ol
o er,ery metal other than gold (the only one
already perfect), so that these metals can be
o .O a transmuted to their perlect state.
OO
o o
a a oo O. fabir's alchemical square. From figures rhat add up to 15
o in anY direction, iabir gets the magical numbers 1 7 and
28. ( 1 7 apparentlr, governs all things metals. fbr
instance. have 1 7 'po\yers ; 28 is the number ol lerrers in
oaa ao
a the Arabic aiphabet, each being assigned to subdivisions
ol heat, cold. dry and moist.)
o o o
aoo oa
o
l5 l5 t5

4 9 2 t5

ffi,m, ffi 3 5 7 I5

ffiffiffi ffi I
t7
I 6

28
I5
 lannis, Lucas

To extract Jabir from all the Geber Corpus three witches in his army, as did the king ol
r,lould be a X{agnum Opus of alchemical Srveden, according to Holinshed, \\,hose
insanity, so intertlvined are the sources, many Chronicles ol English Scottish and trish history
ol them tenrh-century Shi-ite, many iater, some had appeared in 1577. Enlisting rvitches is nor
ol them remarkable in their analysis ol metals, unknou,n in the modern rvorld, since both
metal a1lo1,s and amalgams. Hitler and Churchill consulted them in \\torld
Trvo centuries alter f abir died, his laboratory War ll. And using Holinshed, rvho but
at Kufa u,as demolished, and nothing was Shakespeare could have exposed James's
lound except a great golden mortar. See also ambiguitv abour demonology in so masrerlv a
Baghdad; Caliph; Geber: picarrix. way as untbids in,tfacbeth (1606)? Here \\,e
have it a1l: the nature ol prediction versus the
porver of suggesti\/eness, and hol men deal
lib'l:l with embodied tvitches, all in a play s1u,
The lreemasons' sacred name lor the Hidden flatters .fames as king.
God: Ja : lahveh, God ol Israel; Bul : \,Yitch riding on a goat
Canaanite Ba'al; On :
Hebreu, name for the After an illustrarion in
Egyptian city IWNW, Heliopolis, the perlect cifi, De L(tlltiis \1189.\.
relerred to in Hermetic texts.

Iames VI of Scotland and I of England

\.1.?.6?-1625)

The jittery king. cruel yet credulous, rvho rvas

Rudolph tt's psychological nvin rvhen it came
to indulgence in the Black Arts. His
Daemonologle rvas r,r,ritten belore he succeeded
Elizabeth I to the English throne. Ir was
published in Edinburgh (1597) and ru,ice in
London (1603). James rvas so lascinated y.et so
terrified b1,rvitches that he had to r,l,rite a
disclaimer in order to persecute others and
retain lavour u,ith the Church. He professed to l:h"Th
be scandalized by rhe 'damnable error' of God. The Hebrerv characters, i"l'''l itt Yod, he,
people like lohn Wier, or Reginald Scort vatr, he (JH\iVH). being considered as sacred as
(i538 99) r,lho in his bookDzscov€ry Qf the Egyptian hierogll,phs, meant that the Latin
I,ltitchcrgft (1584) denied the reality of rvitches. translators ol the early Bible, the Sepruagint,
Cornelius Agrippa, John Dee and most ol were not allor,led to utter the name JHWH,
Rudolph ll's court on the Continent had been Jahveh, any more than the lelr,s themselves.
delr,ing into the dark side ol the Unexplained. They used the Hebreur characters fbr 'my Lord',
So had lames, r,vith equal eagerness. tn 15BO which rvhen transliterated into Latin became
Jean Bodin had r,vritten a nasty plece olrvork, 'Adonai'. These letters were then imposed upon
Demonomanie, atracking sorcerers like pico and the consonants JHWH, giving the lancif'ul lorm
Agrippa, to u,hich lames relers his readers. IEHO\AH.
.[ames deals at length u,ith the 'Divel's
School' of those u,ho n ish to scale the sreps ol
Ielnis, Luci: !:')::1:':l:h ::l'i,'ll
rvisdom b1,'mounting lrom degree to degree on
the slippery scale ol curiosity'. yet james kepr A Rosicrucian publisher in the Palatinate, rvho
/oc ha n a n, Al lem a nno, aJl' Co n s tcn ttnop l€

had family and prolessional ties rvith the De century after moving lrom Nisiblis. They had
Bry clan. He printed a prolilic number ol settled in Nisiblis alter moving from Edessa,
alchemical emblem-books, beautifully lvhich had served as a stopplng oll point
engrat ed, including those ol x,{ichael trIaier and during the flight lrom Constantinople alter
Daniel Stolcius.His piice de rlsistance was his being condemned as heretics at the Council ol
encyclopedia, l,[ us oetolt Hermeticum (The Ephesus in,ro431.
Hermetic X,{useum), u,hich nas originally Jundeshapur was one ol the philosophical
published in 1625 in Frankfurt as a briel crossroads under the greal King Chosroes
collection ol nine up-to-date alchemical tracts. Nushir,,van (531-579) r,vhere persecuted people
Alter Jennis's death it rvas re-edited and ol all races and creeds could meet and
enlarged to 21 tracrs in 1678. Borh editions exchange ideas: Greeks who had been tbrced
have the same title page, embellished around out of Athens when |ustinian closed dorvn the
the edge by A,{atthew A,{erian u,ith oval philosophical academies in 529 joined the
medallions ol rhe Four Elements and variations Nestorian, Persian and lndian sages.
on the Chymic Choir (top) and Atalanta Fugiens Chosroes sent his o\vn physician to India to
(bottom). research medical books, lr,hich \vere then
ln typical alchemlcal iashion, lennis's motto translated lrom Sanskrlt into Pahlati (Middle
\vas an anagram ol his name, Lucas lennisius: Persian). and many alchemical B,t,zantine and
'in sinu lucis eas' (may you walk in the lap ol Gnostlc u,orks were translated into Svrian and
lighr). Persian.
all this prepared the ground lor the arrival
|ochanan, Allemanno, of ol Islam in the next century. The academy at
Constantinople (li lteenrh century) lundeshapur produced the lirst scientilically
trained doctor, A1-Harith ibn Kalada
Pico della Mirandola's teacher ol Kabbalah rvho (contemporary with the Prophet Mohammed,
migrated to ltaly, wrote a Kabbalistic midrash and mentioned in the Koran), and the Persian
on the Torah, a treatise on Immortalit), and
helped Pico collect a large library ol valuabie
Jervish u,orks. The versatile Jochanan was not
onl),an expert on Kabbalah but learned in
Greek and Arabian philosophy, too.

Ionson, Ben (c. 1573-16sT)

A bricklayer's stepson, manslayer-turned-
Catholic (temporarilv) and playvright.
His comic satire. The Alchdr?1sr (1610), is a
blting expos6 ol a quack and his ',vhore r,r,ho
have duped a queue ol gold-diggers, delighting
in such names as Abel Drug.qer (a tobacconist)
and Ananias and Tribuiation Wholesome (t\\,0
Puritan Brethren).

l"'d":11!"1
A city in southwest Persia, urhere Svriac
Nestorian alchemists set up in the sixth Ben Ionson.

94
 Ier,l , tr{asarjauraih, u,ho translated Ahron,s
Pcrndects into Arabic and rvrote the lirst Islamic
science textbook.

Iu1s, oy:11:
9a1t !':ri-11.11
|ung uras criticized by Canseliet and Claude
d'Yge, lvho nere alarmed at his comparison,
in
Psychologt and Alchemy, of the art ol alchemv
l'irh pathological visions and dreams.
.\lchem1., they said, is not just a ,projection
of
unconscious fantasies,.

fupiter
The planet ruling tin in the mineral kingdom;
agrimony, endive and oak tree, in the vegetal
kingdom, and the lungs in the animal
kingdom.
The old alchemicai theories about the abilin,
of planets to rransmute into merals might
prove a reality. 11 was announced on
British
radio on 9 April 1 996 that hvdrogen couid
After a detail in Durer's enqravinE of llt:lanchoh,: tl.,e
L,ecome a metal, and that the liquid
state ol the rt'agic s,1ua,e ol lupiL.'t. \\ h05( ,illtnhers,onre ro
pianet Jupiter could become a liquid l4
hydrogen l'hether added verticalll,, horlzontalll. or rliagonall,v.
meta1. Xiagic squares demonstratcd cosmic lau,s. related ro
natural groNth. and $,ere usecl as talismans to attract
qualities ol the planets thel.u,ere associatecl i,r,ith.
ln this
case. Jupiter's cheerfll optimisrn l,as hcld to temper
Saturn's melancho1r,.

oq
 to the 'sealed book' ol rhe Zohar. right up until
the nrrentieth century, rvhen modern
translations started to appear.
The Kabbala Denuddtd rvas a source lor the
teachings of the nineteenth-century occult
Kabbala Denudata (Kabbalah Brotherhood ol rhe Golden Darvn.
nevelt-e-4.)
Kab9llah
A massir,,e Kabbalistic lr,ork of translations into
Latin in three volumes, undertaken betrveen Spelt this rvay, it comes from the Hebrerv
1677 and 1684 by Baron Knorr rron Rosenroth. 'qabalah', tradition, secret docrrine ol Israel,
The original Hebrerv and Aramaic derive fiom supposedll, receil,ed b;'Abraham lrom the
t-he Zohar and symbolic r,r,ork of Isaac Luria, Chaldeans. One ol the four esoteric paths
the sixteenrh-century Palestinian Kabbalist, closely associated rvith alchemlr. See also
and the Book oJPurlrfting Ftre. Cabala; Qabalah.
Although thc lexicon that lills most ol rhe
lirst volume is 'little more rhan a chaos'. and Jeu,ish minnesinger belore a bishop. .. 1 3OO. recirins
the rvhole work, according to Waite, attempts lsrael s histon' ol cxile.
to cover too r,vide a field, nonetheless the
Denudata,lor all its bundling rogether of
material, remained ol'prime value' as a nav in

Desiqn lbr a rirle-

page lor Kabbcrla
D.nucl(tto,
incorporating one ol
the old gll,phs fbr
gold in the sun.

Kalonymides

The lamous lewish dynasty in Italv nrhich

received the teachings ol Babylonian Kabbalah
from Aaron ben Samuel ha-Nasi. a ninth-
century/ Babl,lonian ferv who emigrated ro l.uly.
The Kalonl,mides in turn took the teachings
lvith them to Germany c. ,ro917. For three
centuries rhev u,eren't published until .[udah
the Pious (d. 1217), a member of the same
 Kellqy, Edutard

family, commissioned his pupil, Eleazar of

\Vorms, to spread the oral and rvritten
Kabbalah into wider circles.
Thus Iralian and German Kabbalah is a
bunftanup
direct continuation of ancient Geonic
mvsticism, untouched by outside influences.

Kekuld von Stradonitz, Friedrich

Ausust ,ut
\!?r?
A lvould-be architect turned chemist, ,,r,ho, in
1865, lormulated one of the cron ning
achievements of chemistry ol the nineteenth
century: the theory of the benzene ring. He rvas
prompted in this by his vision (while dozing
on
a bus, he said) ol the Gnostic symbol
ol the
Uroboros holding its own tail in its mouth.
Faraday had discovered benzene in 1825,
bur it u,as Kekuld who understood its atomic
strucrure: c" H.. Mindful ol the great
. he transmuted metals in a goldsmith,s St Dunstan at the feet

alchemical bibliographer-chemist, Berthelot,

laboratory; ol Christ. Dunstan,

Kekul6 was the lirst to define organic chemistry

. he was a skillul rvriter, good at archaic polerful lounder of
Glastonbury Abbey,
as the chemistry of carbon compounds. See
lorms of English, and at forging old 11,35
supposed to be an
also Uroboros. documents;
alchemist and the
. he lost his ears somehow u,hether in patron of goldsmiths.
-
England or Prague is unclear and ,,r,as One ofthe iegends about
o:ll:v: udyl ra yy -t -
"or sl crippled ar some xage be;kre 1586; Kellev is thar he got all
. he tu,as knotvn as ,il Zoppo' in Bohemia.
his alchemical
A man much misunderstood and much knon ledge fron The
labelled; certainllr real, if by another namei The latelul meeting u,ith lohn Dee happened BoakQfDunst(m at
Glasronbury.
certainly the ntenstruum by lvhich on 10 Xilarch 1582, r,vhen Kelley turned up as
lohnDee
sprang to alchemical lile. Edrvard Talbot at Dee's house in Mortlake. He
Kelley, according to Anthony A $rood, was tried to entrap Dee into a conlession ol dealing
born at 4 pm on 1 August 1555 in Worcester. u,ith evil angels. Having failed in this, Kelley
Thereafter little is hisrorically veriliable. Stories arrived again in April, bringing ,a cipher, lor
conflict: Dee to lranslate.
This was the beginning of the strange
. he studied at Oxlord (there are three entries
partnership of magus and crystal_gazer, first in
under the name Edward Talbot at Gloucester
England, then in poland and Bohemia. Even
College);
alter they had parted lor ever, Dee couldn,t ,let
. he rvas a notary or apothecary at Worcester
go' olhim: Dee the earnest intellectual,
or London;
addicted to scryers, Kelley the irascible,
. he was a neighbour ol Dee's in London, and
talented opportunist who ,interpreted' the
together in the 1570s they dug around for
angelic florces, 'heard' lhe voices, ,saw, the
alchemical'kemi' at Glastonburl,; visions in Dee's crystal ball, and ,rvrote, the
. he acquired a mysterious ancient book on
Enochian language, t.he Liber Logaeth that
alchemy, the Book oJDLrnstcrn, r,vhich taught appeared to him in s6ances.
him the Art: The tr,lo did alchemical experiments rvith
 the red porvder that Kelley had somehorv Path are.,vrirten with remarkable clarity.
acquired. Ho',r, lar all these phenomena were The linal comment on Kelley is lrom E1ias
genuine, how far Kelley telepathized, horv far Ashmole's note on the metrical luact Str
he had second sight, holv 1'ar it was Edward Kellqt's Work, printed at the end of the
gobbledeygook is impossible to say. Thea t ru m Chcm icum Bri ru n n icum :

Bound like the Hermetic androgyne, Dee ,n'

'Tis generally reported that Doctor Dee and
Kelley u,enr to poland with their families at
Count Laski's invitation, thence to Bohemia, Sir Edward Kelley were so strangely
where they popped in and out ol Rudolph II's lortunate as to find a very large quantity of
court. Their reputation fluctuated like their the Ellxir in some part of the ruins of
erperiments. Rudolph,s Treasury got no fuller. Glastonbury Abbey u,hich was so incredibly
Dee and Kelley incurred ,4ls displeasure because rich in virtue (being one upon 272,SSO) that
they couldn't produce gold adequately, and the they lost much in making projection by way
Pope's because they conjured up spirits. They of trial belore they lound out the true
left Rudolph's Court to take refuge at Count height ol the medicine ... Whether they
Rozmberk's casrle at nearby Trebon. According lound it ar Glastonbury ... or however they
to Dee's Diary on 19 December 1586, ,EK made came by it, 'tis certain rhey had it.,
projection with his powder'. The lollorving year
Dee notes how Keliel, perlormed the Great
Kerotakis
Work thrice: on 1O May, 24 August, and 14
December. Meanu,hile, in October 1586, An
Rudolph had rvritten to the Count requesting alchemicai
Kelley's presence to superuise an alchemical brazier,
Operation that was in progress. Dee handed reputedll,
over to Kel1ey all his 'powder, and ,books,. invented by
Kelley knerv there was no benelit to him in Mary the
staying with Dee, but something could be of
.[ewess
gained lrom Count Rozmberk and from 'bain-marie'
Rudolph. lame.
For a while, Kelly fared better once Dee had Originally a
1eft. He became the darling olRudolph,s court palette for
and was knighted. He stayed in lavour during artists to
1589-90, doing his Magnum Opuses or Magna keep their Kerotakis or Alexandrian brazier
Opera. Suddenly in May 1591, he was ordered paints fluid
into prison. His tricks had caughr up with him. and kept over a charcoal-burner, this three-
He r,vas in and out of prison until his death, legged doll is one.
which was not on 2E November 1595 I,vhen
Dee records inhis Dtal,t'the newes that Sir
Kether
Edward Kelley was slayne'. He was certainly
alive, if struggling, rn 159T ar Mosr Castle near The 'crown' in sephirotic systems olKabbalah.
Prague. He was not ignored. The alchemist In Hebrew, Kether is masculine, so 'praised be
Osrvald Croll visited him in prison there, and he the Crown' is 'Praised be He'.
was remembered in trIichael Maier,s Symbola
Aure(te l,[ensae. It is not known whether, in
Key of Solomon
1596, he really did send out from prison his
manuscript to Rudolph on The Stone oJ the A grimoire thar was supposedly rhe 'Open
Philosophers, but that work and his Humid Sesame' to the ancient wisdom of Solomon.

98
 Khttnrath, Heinrich

ranking next to the Emerald Tablet as the most

celebrated ol magical rexrs, of the sort
consulred b1, Trithemius, Cornelius Agrippa and
Dee. It assumed man1, forms. A printed yersion
n,ould have had no ,virtu,. The text had to be
copied out by hand by each person rvho n ished
to use it, so that the mind of the magician
t,ould impregnate the calligraphy,
translorming and'personalizing' it.
For some Kabbalists, the Art ol
manipulating the Shemahamphorash, the 72
names of Jahveh, in order to find the keys ol
universal science, rvas known as the Keys of
Solomon.
At the University of Krakolv, f ohn Dee in
i 584 would have found several versions of the
Clavicula Salomonis (Little Key ol Solomon), making, belore he had tracked down Morienus Krakor, in the tlfteenth
the grimoire thar the polish Bishop in his hermitage at ]erusalem, is no doubt
|an century. Krakorv rvas
Dziadulski (1496-1559) had actually apocryphal. home to Count Laski
encouraged his congregation to study. But the There exist a number of books under
and to occult studies. lts
Church decided thar the information should be universit), housed man1,
Khalid's name: The Book oJAmulets, The Book Hermetic texts.
the reserve ol the priesrhood alone. The oJ The Testament on th€ Art Great ancl
and, The
Clcwiculct should not have ,leaked out, into Small Books of the Scroll. The most famous
general circulation. It was intended lor book ascribed to Khalid by a seventeenth-
ritualistic use. century Muslim biographer, Hajii Khalfa, is Z?a
Par(tdise oJWtsdom. But most of Khalid's
nhilld wisdom is embedded in a mass of pseud-
iii::? l?i) epigraphia.
One ol the legendary founders olArabian
alchemy and a grandson of the first Umayyad
KhlnTlh: H:-ilTh o:!
Caliph, Mu'ar,viya (reigned 661-6BO). According !l:: 1?, ll
to Ibn al-Nadim, the renrh-century biographer, Born in Leipzig, Khunrath studied in Basel and
Prince Khalid, son of Caliph yazid,I, as a yourh became a 'Doctor of this and that medicine,, as
in Damascus gor caughr up in a coun rumpus he called himself. He \\,as a practising
over succession, so retired to devote his lile to alchemist and cabalist, connecred lvith the
the sciences, alchemy in particular. Al-Nadim Rosicrucian Brotherhood, as revealed in his
says thar Khalid asked for Greek philosophers mystical emblems. Even for an alchemist. he
to be broughr from Egypt to rranslare rvas of 'a strange exotic kind,. Waite talks
alchemical rracts from Greek and Coptic (late about Khunrath's'luliginous terminolog,,,,
Egyptian or Syriac) inro Arabic. ,This,' says al_ which is rather apt, metaphorically, rvhile
Nadim, 'was the first translation from one literally Khunrath's presentation is a bit sooty,
Ianguage to another in lslam.' r,vith ink blots in the cramped handwritten
Khalid supposedly became a disciple ol Latin, Greek, Hebretv and German jumble that
Morienus, the Alexandrian alchemist who had squeezes into the rocks and pillars olhis
studied under Stephanos, although the tale ol pictures. Khunrath anticipated not only the
Khalid beheading the alchemical quacks who theosophist Boehme (who incidentally
had previously been putting on sho,,r,s ol gold_ appropriated almost verbatim manv of

99
Kroll, /.

Khunrath's spiritual aphorisms 'the rvorld represent the four stages of initiation and the
must be made heaven, and heaven the rvorld' - lour esoteric paths:
and suchlike) but the lesuit E$/ptologist
Firstly, the Path oi Kabbalah.
Athanasius Kircher and even William Blake.
Secondly, the Path oluagic.
He resided in Hamburg. practising
Thirdly, the Path of Alchem1,.
iatrochemistry and alchemy. From there, in
Fourthly, the Path ofTheurgv: The Lab-
1589 (on 27 June according to Ashmole), he
oratory. All rvork is sacred. Through doing
went to Bremen to meet john Dee, who was on
the Magnum opus, all the other parhs
his way back lrom Count Rozmberk in
(Kabbalah, Magic, Alchemy) come together.
Bohemia; Khunrath probably got an
God's elect do not cease to be human. Work
introduction lrom Dee to his patron Rozmberk,
strengthens the body, prayer the spirit.
rvho was a sick man. Khunrath did go to
Bohemia, and as a physician-alchemist, hovered In later editions ol the Amphithe(ttre, lhese lour
on the edge ofRudoph II's entourage. In 1598 emblematic plates were increased b1, eight more,
Rudolph issued him a 'privilegium' (copyrighQ intended by editors to clari$r and link in r,vith
to protect hls works r,vhether written, engraved, the originals. The visionary landscapes r,vith
medicinal, alchemical or cabalistic. Fina11y, their Latin, Greek, Hebrew and German
Khunrath settled in Dresden, rvhere he died in inscriptions, their hieroglyphic obelisks, rocks
poverty some time benveen 1601 and 1605. and vistas, are reflections ol other Utopias, the
Khunrath's philosophy is summed up in the Christtanopolis of Andreae or the Cittc del Sole
frontispiece of the lirst edition ( 1 602) ol his of Campanella.
strange emblematic work Amphithectre oJ
Eternal lVisdom: Kroll,;.
(late ninteenth to early tr,ventieth century)
PERSEVERANDO
ORANDO, LABOR,4,NDO
A German historian, who revolutionized
NEC TU,4,TIDE, NEC TI,4{IDE
modern thinking about the placing and dating
(Persevere, pray, rvork, without pride and ol Hermetic texts. Previous theories rested on
rvithout lalse modesty.) lsaac Casaubon's editing, that they paralleled St
Paul in time, and borrorved lrom Plato. Kroll
For Khunrath, the cosmos is a nork ol recognized the texts as being pre-Christian: as
supernal alchemy, perlormed in the crucible of iar back as the third century nc possibly.
God. Man can attain the wisdom of the cosmos Moreover, he studied the Chaldean Oracles and
through the twofold path ol the Laboratory established that they stemmed from a single
(alchemical praxis) and the oratory poem in the style ol Greek Sybilline r,erses.
(contemplative prayer). Khunrath sees man as
the subject of the Art (of alchemy); his soul is Kulliytat
'intincted' and becomes the Stone, transmuted (On the General Rules oJMedicine)
and transmuting.
Having written three sma11 alchemical tracts A brilliant work by the greal Arabian
on Symbols, oa the C(ttholic Magnesia oJ the philosopher-alchemist, Averroes. The Latin
Phllosophers and on Azoth, Khunrath prepared translation b;, the 1ew Bonacosa, the Colliget
lor his Magnum Opus, his Amphitheatrum (Padua, 1265), $ras the lirst major contribution
Sapientiae Aetern(re Chis tlcno-Kabalis ticum. He to the Arabic-Latin alchemical translations ol
drew sketches for four p\ates: The Cosmic northern Italy. The treatise was still being
Christ, Adam and Eve Coryioined, the studied, alter the invention ol printing, up
Philosopher's Stone afid the Lcboratory. These to 1560.

100
 ,.no.o-,n,:ry-

The alchemist's place of r,vork and ol praver,

his oratory. Traditionally, the apparatus ol rhe
adept are fe.uv: a lurnace or athanor (Arabic ,al-
tannur'), r,lhich allowed coke to burn very
slowly; a philosopher's egg or retorti a glass
rressel ',vith a long down-bent neck lor heating
mercury and for purification; a crucible, which
\\ras an earthentvare melting-pot for metals; a
pelican or still r,vith a dome at the top of its verse. Half or more resemble the emblems in The alchemist's
belly from rvhich led tubes or ,beals,, through Atalantcr Fugiens. laboratory. after a
lr,hich the distilled liquid dripped back into the The Book leads the reader through the fifieenth-century
bottom ol the still. cartoon.
archetypal alchemical symbolism of dra.qons,
The Canon's Yeoman in Chaucer's 7/ze lions, deer, fish and unicorns (variations on
Ccrnterbttry Tctles describes the laboratory with body, soul and spirit) ro the rebirrhing of the
its crucibles, flasks and retorts r,vhose contents Son through the Father, r,vith the ancient
r,lere subjected to processes of heating, mixing psychopomp, the rvinged Mercury, mediating as
and cooling, a dozen times or more. The the magician Merlln or Merculinus. See also
technical names \,vere often indiscriminatelv Psychopomp.
used, and each alchemist had his own met;od
ol calcinarion. solution. separation.
conjunction, putrilaction, congelation, cibation, The Coat ofArms ol
sublimation, lermentation, exaltation, Lambspring

mulriplication and projection.

The projection ol the liquid upon base metal
',vas expected (or hoped) to transmute it into
gold.

,T'b-'f'lls
The emblematic Book oJLambspring appears in
Lucas |ennis's Musaeum Hermettcum
(Frankfurt, 1625 . n may well derive lrom the
,\

text known as De Laplde philosphico in the

Triga Chemica Collection ol Nicolas Barnaud
(Prague, 1599), and indeed it circulated during
the 15BOs round the Rhineland and the
Netherlands in manuscript form.
It is a delightful handbook for the
contemplatlve alchemist: a spiritual journey
through 15 double-spreads of picture and Ihe Coat of Arrns of [ambSpring

tol
 Lapidary

Laprd,ary Geraldi was the first (1687-90); Lascaris was

the second (1693 1 740 or so); and Count
Both object and agent - i.e. a book classifying Saint-Germain the third (17 43-84) . All ol them
stonesi and a gemmologist, goldsmith or stone- appeared benveen 45 and 50 years old but
cutter. There were dozens of books on the ne\rer grew older. A11 ol them had the 'red
subiect in the Middle Ages. The favourite powder' and could perlorm the Magnum Opus
lapidaries tvere Arabian and concentrated on manv times. A11 ref'used lood and sex. All were
the efficacl,of stones as talismans. The Book of tr'lediterranean in appearance and r,oice; all
Ston€s,long attributed to Aristotle, \\rith lvere garrulous. lt seems likeiy that all lvere
translations in Hebrerv and Latin. examined Rosicrucians rvhose mission was to 'multiply'
the magical por,r,er of stofles; The Flowers oJ alchemically around the wor1d, proving the
Knotvledge oJStones (1154) appeared lrom the truth ol the Arr.
pen ol the alchemist Shihab al-Din al-Tifashi of In spite ol high ideals, Lascaris lelt a trail ol
Cairo; rvhile the best knorvn ol all gem-books legai cases in his lvake. He played upon the
was the colourfulLdpidario olthe versatlle incredulity and greed ol people. 'Lascaris'
thirteeth-century monarch, Allonso X ol meant 'sailor' and rvas used. in contempt, of
Castille. Levantine sto\\ra\,vays. Man1, are the
Collections of books on stones were improbable stories of unsuspecting men,
commonplace in Alexandria among glass, includlng the young Bortger, rhat Lascaris
culters and stone-engravers. Chrysopoeia was rvaylaid, held 'rvith his glittering eye' like the
the alchemical practice of gold-making, and Ancient Mariner, and subverted into perlorming
developed to a royal Art by such as Zosimos the transmutation with rhe red powder that he
and Ostanes. Books on the philosophical Srone gave them.
abound, 'The stone which is not a stone,. Many Eventually, Lascaris in spite of anonl,mity
an alchemist wrote his De Lapide Kelley, rvas alerted that the Elector Palatine wished to
Sendivogius and Barnaud, to name three. arrest him. He begged sanctuary at the house
The most famous human lapidary was of Countess Anna Sophia von Erbach. When
Anselm Boethius de Boodt, a doctor to Rudolph the danger was over, he transmuted much of
II ol Prague and his Chief Lapidary. His her household silver into gold, rvhich was
Gemmarum et Lapldum Hlstoria (1609) rvas verified b), rhe local goldsmith's certificares.
probably the mosr important history ol gems Inevitably, word of this remarkable
and stones ol that century. It was a complete transmutation got around, particularly to the
reclassification of stones, their origins and Countess' estranged husband, who decided
properties - both benevolent and malevolent
- after all that he was still married to her. and
their energies and 'virfues'. Like his demanded hall rhe alchemical go1d. The rvhole
contemporary lapidary, Agostino Riccio lrom case came to court at Leipzig in 12i3. The
Venice, Boethius was an alchemist and natural court ruled that the Countess should keep the
scientist. The rich veins of metal ore. mines gold, because as silver it had belonged to her.
and stone quarries olBohemia and the Giant Wisel1,, Lascaris disappeared after this. See also
Mountains attracted manv such Croesuses and Bottger.
budding geologists.

t:?d
L3::ili:
A powerlul cumulative poison known in
Another case of the disappearing alchemistl Babylon to contain antimony. Lead is not just a
One ol three alchemists who appeared then metal, but one of the alchemical symbols for $
disappeared ber',veen 1687 and 1784. Signor dark, lustreless prime matter. Governed by f.
li
(t

102
$
 Lull, Ramon

Saturn, it combines with ordinary silver in the 1316; more likely he is a composite invention,
process of cupellation to purilv the sihrer into symbolizing a mystical philosophy in which all
Philosophic X,lercury in the ear11r stages of the truths can be demonstrated by inspired jugglery
llagnum Opus. See Cupellation; Valentine. ('ars combinandi'). Lullian theories lvere a
mixture ol magic, divine power ol names and
conjuring angels, and medieval cabala. The
"^"_g-".1:o-: praxis rvas a kind of alchem;,; magical
A flifteenth-century version ol the Clavicula Operations, summoning angels, tvorking rvith
Salomonis (Little Key ol Solomon), rhe symbolic numbers and letters and
Kabbalistic grimoire that alchemists such as contemplating the World Soul that iniused the
Dee had studied. three worlds ol the Trinity.
Voluminous works have turned up under
Ley_*l his name such as the Trqctcttus de Astronomia
l1eyrus_ and The l,yorks oJLull at rhe end of the Berne,
.\n Egyptian Late Kingdom magical papyrus, c. 1545 edition ol the Summa Peylfectlonis , and
500ec, containing alchemical r,vritings, nou, in the collection of texts dated 1628 under the
the Leyden Museum, Holland. The lormat, an title Novum Lumen Chymicum, written in Latin
extended incantation to negate the power ol 'in a lair hand'. Lull is cited in the
the Sethian serpent Apopis, merges together Philosophorum Praeclqra l,[on lra (The Most
the various creation myths and matches Renowned Maxims ol Philosophers) along with
aspects of creation with magical numbers, Ripley and Villanova. He ligures as one of
P,vthagorean fashion. Maier's 12 heroes in the Symbola Aureae
l,lensae (16 1 7) and his Testamentum appears
in Zetzner's Theatrum Chemiarm Tome IV
'l:i 1659, along with Bruno's commentary, and in
Lion swallowing the
sun: 'the true green and
golden Iion'
The lion symbolizes gold or rhe sun. The Green Manger's 1.702 Btbllotheca Chemica Curiosa
symbolizing the
Lion swallorving the sun is an alchemical Tome I. The lirst part of his Testament ts the transformation of prlma
symbol lor gold being dissolved in a mixture ol Theorla and the second materia.
nitric and hydrochloric acids called 'aqua regia' part is the Prqctica.
(royal water). Lull states that he
Ne\,vton in his alchemical reveries mused obtained the congelation of
Iong over the story of Daniel in the Lion's Den. common mercury by
The mythologv oi the Egyptians always had a means ol its menstrual,
lion as the guardian ol sacred places. This and that he perlormed the
could date back to the priests ol Heliopolis who experiment near Naples 'in
incorporated into their solar creed the lion as the presence of a natural
the guardian of the gates ol the underworld. philosopher and fairhful
The Lion Sphinx was sentinel, while its human associates'. in
leatures are thought to have been those ol the Experlmenta, s.v. Allud
early sun deity, Atum. Exp eri m en tu m XYXU, Lull
recurs to the congelation ol
Llll:-Ri*:i Mercury and says his
'operation' was performed
A mysterious Balearic islander ol Catalan origin in front ol'King
rvho comes and goes through alchemical Partinopeus'. This
commentaries Iike a will-o'-the-wisp. He may gentleman appears to be
have been a real alchemist living ftom l2Z4 to pure mythl
 to reach higher states ol translormation than
the confines ol oilicial religion u,ould a1lorv.
Handbooks and instruments remain: the
Plcatrl"r, the grimoires of popes, ke1,s, Cornellus
Agrippa's Occttl ta Phi los op hia, sigils,
Magic gemstones, engrar,,ed rvands and speaking
slr,ords, but hol the), were used remains
Practised bv alchemists since the beginning ol u,ithin the secret tradition of the initiates.
their recorded histor"l,, magic opens doors Cabalistically, the term 'mage' overlaps in
through ritual, spells or psychological meaning rvith 'image'. something the
manipuiation. lt derives lrom rhe Greek 'I4agos' 'imagination' can invent and empolver. So by a
a magician, and 'i\lagela' magic (variations of curious transference, in the Renaissance,
'A,1og'. 'Megh', 'X{agh' in Pahlavi and Zend : Leonardo da Vinci relers to a 'macchia', a spot
priest, wise, and excellent; cognate rvith to stimulate the artistic 'imagination', rvhile the
'A''laghdim', supreme lr,isdom. in Chaldean). A,,lannerist painter Arcimboldo looks on his
Among the ancient Persians and Eg.,ptians, sketches as 'macchie' ('maggia', 'maggie'),
rhe Magi were those rvho had a higher magical shapes transtbrming chaos.
knou,ledge of nature. As Croll says in his Words suffer degradation over the centuries.
Bastlica:'A,lagia is the means by lr,hich nature A'magician' is no longer revered as a magus;
intended man ro explore.' Alchemists had a magic no longer implies the Eleusinian
thirst lor magical books, manuals lrom the mvsteries or a path olrvisdom fbr the initiated.
ancient world, a thirst to decode obelisks, The act of r,vriting and drarving is no longer
papyri and gl;'phs, and ro empower ralismans sacred.

M1s1"'oll:
The Great Work, to rvhich all alchemists aspire,
the alchemical Operation. The paradox is that it
was not just one Operation but two: the iirst
being the making ol the Stone and the second
being the using or projecting of it. See also
Philosophic Mercury, Salt and Sulphur.

*,ul:'t rl.h t
?:t \r ?.? -:.u.r.r)
#
The German Hermes, a musical, Rosicrucian tr

alchemist rvhose phenomenal output in the

ffi
space ol six years r,vas published largely by the
\'+ fr
De Brvs and b) Lucas lennis. ffi
&
tr
The Magnum Opus incorporating: the square. triangle
and circle; the heavenllr bodies and metals: the sign ol $
Saturn (lead) pointing dorvn to the cubic Stone, r,hich is
$
in turn circulated b1,fir,e stars (planers), the King and
ffi
Quccn \\,ith their rcspectir,e atrributes go1d, sun, lion.
lire, earth versus sih'er, moon, dolphin, air and u,ater
sit on opposite sides ol the Stone, auraiting purification
befbre conlunction.

104
 Ma[monides, Rabbi ],Ioses ben,4,tdirnon or ,Rambam

Maier was born in Rindsberg, Holstein. Alter flattered his German homeland), the Septimana
he had graduared as a Doctor of Medicine, he Philosophtca (The philosopher's Week) and
lived at Rostock. He somehow became personal Ulysses (symbol of absolute human r,visdom),
physician in prague to Rudolph II, lvho upped published posrhumously in 1624. Finally Maier
his position ro 'Count' Michael Maier, thence rvas ediror ol The Golden Tipod, publishedby
up again to Doctor of philosophy and Alchemy
.[ennis in 1618 as a collection of three
and Private Secretary. On the death of Ru<iolph alchemical tracts: Basil yalentine's Twelve
in 1.612, Maier hastened to Holland and Fqs, Norton's Ordtnall and Cremer, Abbot ol
Germany, then England, u,here he made links Westminster's T$rcm€n t.
lr,ith Robert Fludd and King james I,s
physician, Sir William paddy. Since his
Maimonides, Rabbi Moses ben Maimon
personal life had not been beyond reproach,
o1 01'11*'
and Rudolph's court had now disintegrared, !!'ll _!??!)
Maier probably r,vondered rvho to attach A Spanish-lelvish alchemist and philosopher,
himself to next. It was Moritz, Landgrave of controversial and modern in his outlook ol
Hesse-Kassel, lortunately, rvho gave him 'comparative' study as compared r,vith
money to spy and patronage to rvrite. 'absolute', Maimonides was one of the great
The Lutheran X,Iaier experienced the philosophic pillars of rhe Middle Ages, whose
Eucharist as alchemical translormation, and authority stretched over many disciplines:
reflecting this, his contorted works streamed science, alchemy, philosophy, religion,
oflhis pen in lumbering, cryptic cermano_ medicine and languages.
Latin, rvith impossible titles (here
summarized). In 1614 appeared hisArcqna
Arcanisslma (Secret of Secrets), interpreting
Greek myths alchemically; in 1616 his De
Circulo Physico euadrato (On Squaring the
Physlcist's Circle); in 161 Z his Lusus Serius,
rvhich summed up the whole ethos of alchemy
as a Serious foke, and rvas dedicated to a
dubious English alchemist, Dr Francis
%ty,,to=\Dlnr)
Born in Cordova and educated by a learned x,'laimonides s signature
Anthony; in the same vear his Symbola Aureae lather under an Arab master, Maimonides
which rvere accounts ol 12 exemplary
tX,l€nsae,
when still young had to flee rvith hls lamily
alchemists or'sophic apostles,; his from lanatics. He became the archetypal
/ocus
Severus (An Earnest.Jesr), a bird_debate in rvandering lew, ending up in Cairo in 1155 as a
which ultimately the owl is crowned court physician and philosopher. There he
Queen;
his Exarnen Fucorum (A Gaggle ol taught that there is no conflict between
Quacks
Exposedt. revealed religion ol the Torah and truths
AII rhis built up ro rhe year 1618, in rvhich rvorked out by reason.
rvere publlshed Maier's Silentlum post
His Gutdeibr the perplexed, written in
Cl(tmores (Slience Alter the Outburts) and his Arabic in Cairo c.1200 lor intellectuals, covers
Themis Aurea (The Golden Themls, Goddess of a complete metaphysical slstem: all physics
fustice - i.e. the Golden Rule). Then, as if after and philosophy, all codes ol behaviour, can be
long incubation, the philosophlc egg burst decided either by reason or b1z revealed truth;
lorth the emblematic,4/a lanta Fugi€ns \vith that in lact the conclusions (,natija,) of reason
wondrous engravings by Matther,v Merian. amount to exactly the same as the results or
Therealter, a quiet dying dotvn, u,ith a number conclusions ol revelation.
of tracts, including the Verum Int entum (which Maimonides' rvorld-system was inspired by

105
 l,langet, .lean]acques

Aristotle, rvhose rvritings were available to the Hapsburg emperor is said to have searched, in
Arab r,vorld via Hunayn and Avicenna. 1515, the Benedictine archives at Rome and
Maimonides exerted a great influence on made many different enquiries in monasteries
western philosophers, alchemists and even for particulars of the Benedictine alchemist
monks, especialll rhe Dominicans. Basil Valentine and his remains, but with no
success. Nothing olValentine's appeared in
M.": u. writlng untll- well after Maximilian's death -
|
-s-?t, " ?"- I -q lli- in1604 The Chaiot oJAnt{mory/ r,vas published
A seventeenth-century Swiss doctor and by lohann Tholden Hessius (Tholde).
amateur alchemist, editor of the Bibliothecq Maximilian, 'lion of the Sourh German
Chemica Curiosa (The Carelul Enquirer,s humanists', had several alchemical/
Chemical Library), published in rrvo large lolio astronomical books dedicared to him, including
volumes (Geneva, 1702). This anthologr Iohann Stoeffler's Calendarium Rom(tnum
contains the cream oi traditional alchemical Magnum and Trithemius's manuscript on
literature, lact and iiction being swallowed magical writing, the S teganographta.
together: Geber, the Arabians, Hermes
Trismegistus, Lull, Arnold Villanova, Bernard
tvt11s!ruum
of Trevisa, Helr,etius andthe,Mutus Liber.
Some of the delights ol Manget are his An alkahest for extraction purposes; a solvent,
chatty asides and anecdotes; for instance, the having the power of dissolving and re-forming.
tale about Boyle and the shabby srranger lvho The word lvas used as the alchemical parallel
brought some red powder then disappeared - a betr,veen the transmutatory action of the
familiar formulal. solvent on metal being changed into gold and
rhe supposed action of the menses on the
,i:|i.i 1byt
Ahmad at*1irili ovum.
{!1

A tenth-centurv Arab from Madrid,

i$
M-:1::',v s
mathematician, astronomer and reputed author
ol the Ghayat a\-hakim , known in translarion ',1 along with O tr
as the Ptccttrix. This became the indispensable and L are the &
s
grimoire ol ritual magic and seances for such only planetary
magi as Pico, Trithemius and Cornelius symbols that can
.!
Agrippa, and such monarchs as Allonso X ol be traced to
Castille and Rudolph II oi Bohemia. The book antiquity. 'Heaven i.
,ai'
endowed its users with porvers in angel- and earth have
summoning and power lrom the stars. If been created out
philosophy was the cause, rhen alchemy and of nothingness,
astronomy were the elfects lthe ,conclusions,) but they are
ol using this book. Ir is interesting to speculate composed ol three
how far Pico was influenced by these hotch- things -
potch magical conclusions ('natija,) of mercurius,
Maslama in his own Conclusions. See also sulphur and sal',
Ghayat al-hakim; Natija; picatrix. says Paracelsus.
The hierogiyphic monad, a
Alchemical
*iI:'lliii' $
:??
-_:?,,) Mercury is the
pictorial rvorld system and
variation on the ankh, the
'essence', Salt is caduceus and the giyph of
In his zeal for the supposed sciences, this the'body'or mercurv.

106
 ll€tamorphoses or The Golden Ass

CHEMATA ECLYPSIVN LV SCHEMATA ECLYPSIVM L\

cvM IVSTA TEMPoRVM ANNOTATIoT{E
iirxegvm MINARIVM, CVM IV$TA TEMPORVM ANNOTATIONE,

]ohann Stoefiler's
Cdlendar[um, dedicated
to luaximilian T.

'ashes', and Sulphur the 'oil' clinging to rvhen magical practices and talismanic alchemy
Mercury. abounded. In the altermath of any great Empire
The most important yet the most elusive, or that has turned to mental, moral and physical
volatile, of the metals, mercury has myriad sickness, there is a lienetic resurgence of
names, ranging from 'mother of minerals and magic. Pliny writes of Druids, soothsayers,
metals and their first matter' to ,terrene healers, alchemists, sorcerers and augurers;
unctuosity'; and from 'gluten' to ,blood ol the and he enumerates the virtues of precious
red lion'. Chemically, mercury is Hg stones. minerals, saliva and the lour humours.
(hydrarg,,rum, silver water) ; however, The fanrasy of Metcmorphoses is alchemical
Philosophic Mercury is not to be confused tvith in its concept of translormation. Wltches
common quicksilver. posses the power of translorming their enemies
into animals. They can bring the dead back to
Metamorphoses, or The Golden Ass life, they can spel1-bind, rhey use human blood,
hair and lingernails in their r,vorking, and they
9:::11 ::i::y ^:l know the power of words ol invocation.
Metamorphoses is one of the most lantasric Apuleius's,,1pologla is his delence against
poems of Silver Latin. Its author, Apuleius, the accusation ol magic. He distinguishes
lived in the post-decadent Roman Empire, betll,een rvhite magic indicated by the simple
l,:lidrash

use of the word 'magic' - and black magic Spain c. 1.275 and lvrote midrashim on the
u,hich he condemns. He deiends the study of Torah, Book ol Lamentations and Song of
natural history, alchemistically used for human Songs. By 1280 he had produced the main
good and religion. His orientation is mystical. body ol the Zohar and continued r,vriting his
own Kabbalistic commentaries in a mixture ol
y1*i:ilTi Hebrerv and Aramaic. By 1305, Moses was
'ld1Th !g:111
referring to hrs own Zoha.r.
A runnlng commentary on the Jewish
Scriptures ol the Old Testament, from the root uu1y1_rite1
D-R-SH : to seek, to seek out the meaning.
There were two lorms of midrash. First, the A jervel ol an emblem-book, lirst published by
halakah ('oth), from the root H-L-kK: to wa1k, Pierre Savouret (La Rochelle, 1677), then
which rvere the regulations regarding civil and published as an addition to the first volume of
religious law, supposed to show the rvay a man Manget's Bibliotheca Chemlca Curlosa (1702),
should walk in the biblical laws. Second, there although Manget does not reler to it in his text.
rvere the haggadah (-oth), from N-G-D : ro The l.futus Liber (Book Wirhout \iVords) is a
recount or to tell, which rvere expositions of seriesof 15 engraved lolio plates showing the
biblical stories or parables. stages of the alchemical Operation, which sum
up the mystical relatlonships betu,een the
natural, chemical and spiritual worlds.
':lvb::h1:"* The twentieth-century alchemist Arnaud
An alloy ol copper and lead. Barbault was so inspired by this book and the
explicit nature of the delv-collecting plates that $
M-::i he did hls own experiments exactly as the i
,n
1,
plates depicted and always said that he hid
ir
Representing Silver, the Lesser Work, or nothing: 'Those lr,ho hal,e eyes to see, let them
Mercury, the tr4oon conjoins r,vith the Sun, see.' The creator of the .Mutus Liber is not
Cold, in the Crearer Work. known, although the lirst emblem, of lacob
asleep on a 'Stone' pillow below the ladder
t.6,1 with Angels ascending and descending, points
'::": * li::-::i:::l lo either a .[acob Saulat or a Jacob To116, a
The question tvhether Moses, who called doctor lrom La Rochelle (1630-96), goldsmirh/
himself Moses, son of Shem Tov from the City alchemist.
ol Leon, rvas a devoted scribe or devious author
can never be solved, but he is thought by most Mv11"::
scholars norv to be the originator and compiler IihST !:i:ll ::t :i:::::h ::i:,'vl
of Zohar, rather than merely a scribe
the ln the rvake oiMaier in Hesse, came Mylius,
copying ancient wisdom. He was involved in with his updated history ol metal transmutarion,
the Kabbalistic movement that had emerged in Phllosophia Rerbrmata, published by Lucas
twelfth- and thirteenth-century Catalonia and .fennis, the Rosicrucian sympathizer (Franklurt,
Provence. His Se"fur ha-Rlmmon (Book of r.he 1622 ). Buried in the erudite rext were 60
Pomegranate) lashed out at \,vealthy superb emblems (lrom .[ennis's'picture-bank'),
assimilated Spanish Jews who neglected their symbolizing alchemical birth, death, marriage
tradition, while his Or Zaru'a (Sown Light) and sublimation. These were unearthed again
showed Moses' dismay at lack ol spiritualitl, or by.fennis and copied a couple of years later for
intellectual purpose. Daniel Stolcius's Viridarlunt Chemicum. See
Moses settled in Guadalajara in central also Jennis; Maier; Stolcius.

108
 l,lyrobalanrfruIt

'vI:bil1ll*l'
An alchemical symbol ol healing in Tibetan
medicine; the supreme salve that cures all
illnesses.
Under the section 'Compound purgers, in
his Anatomy oJ Melanchcty, Burron mentions
live kinds of myrobalans or Indian plums,
alongside 'pil1s one would not wish to be
without', such as Cochia llith Hellebore. See
also Burton; Food.

N,lyrobalan. symbol of supreme healing. Thls fiuit, lvhich

is iound in India and Tiber. is menrioned by both Burton
and Rabelais.

109
 creatures, and the heavens, the higher world of
gods torvards which the snakes srretch.They
are inscribed on stone tablets called'nagahals'
at the entrance to temples.
The chiel pursuit ol nagayuna is the
transmutation of substances to presen/e the
Tu-s-1ry"1
vital elixir ol life and so bring about a physical
The Indian path of alchemy. The 'naga, are the balance of immutable duration ll,hen all the
two entwined serpenrs of ancient India, the energies ol the body are unilied.
svmbols ol alchemical transformation from the The Rtg-Veda describes the Soma Rasa - the
lorver levels to the higher. The 'naga' are direct juice ol the Soma planr as 'amrita', akin to
precursors of the caduceus, the serpents ol ambrosia, which alter long preparation has an
sl,mbolizing the healing link between
A,,lercury, astounding eflect on the body, no less than the
the undem,orld of Earth Morher, ol the lower 'roar of a bull', reviralizing sex and healing
energies. The zenith of Indian alchemy was rhe
tantric renaissance from 700 to 1300, r,vhich
locused on the affinities between the body and
the cosmos and on attuning the body with
metal, air and fire: the metal was 'rasa',
mercury; the air tvas breathing exercises; the
lire was sun meditation. In theory, mercury ,&
alone would combine with alr, blood, semen or
ashes to produce the transcendental state, but
in practice other ingredients were added: mica,
sulphur and orpia. The chiel alchemical book
was the RGsarnqya, c. an1200, a tantric
treatise describing 1B mercurial processes.

N1liia
Derived from the Arabic meaning the
'conclusions' or results ol philosophy that is,
alchemy, rransmuted thought, the
manilestations of creation and the realization
ol the Logos. Maslama inhis Ghayat (tenth
century), Maimonides inhis Guideikr the
Perplexed (c. 1200), Plco del1a Mirandola in his
Conclusiones Philosophicae, Cabalisticae et
Theologicae (Rome, 1486) and Eirenaeus
Philalethes inhis Riplqr Revtved (16T8), all
rvrote about 'conclusions': alchemy, or the
physical results of cabalistic thought.

*:::o:o-*i'::
The title page ol the Necronomicon, the grimolre
supposedil,' translated blr.John Dee and prinred in Al Azlf, the grimoire supposedly composed in
An t\'verp. 730 at Damascus byAbdul Alhazred, under the

110
 Neh,ton, S[r Isa(k

Umayyad caliphate, and translated in Greek as Ephesus in 431 as heretics and started on their
the Necronomlcon (The Book of Dead Names) in long haul ol fleeing persecution - lirst to
950 by Theodoros Philatelas. The tale goes rhar Edessa, lrom where they were ejected ln 489,
Patriarch Michael had the book burned in then to Nlsiblis, then to Jundeshapur,
1050, but secret copies were rescued and Damascus and Baghdad, where they lormed
translated from Greek into Latin by Olaus the great centres ol science and translation
Wormius in 1228. Pope Gregory IX (reigned under the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphs. They
1227-41) put an embargo on both Latin and penetrated the heart ofAsia, even China, and
Greek editions in 1232, but a Black Letter were particularly industrious. Imbued with the
edition appeared in Germany c. 1440, and the Egrptian mysteries and Greek Classics, the
Greek version was printed in ltaly between Nestorians disseminated alchemical tracts to
1500 and 1550. Islam after Erypt had become either fanatically
The myth ties up too nearly, in that lohn Christian or drowned with occultism and
Dee is supposed to have translated the debased magic. Their language, Syriac (a late
Necronomicon as The Book oJDecrd Names, and Aramaic or Coptic development from Egzptian)
had it published at Antwerp (1571) by his had gradually taken over from Greek as the
friend, Silvius, I'vho had already published language oi the educated classes. See also
Dee's Monas Hieroglyphica (1564). Baghdad; Damascus; Jundeshapur; Syriac.

Newton, Sir Isaac

Y:tlT:,i:,, (b. Christmas Day, 1642, \,Voolsthorpe,
The mystic philosophy of certain schools that Lincolnshire; d. 20 March 1727, Lorrdon\
promoted the teaching of plato yet modilied it
in various ways. More specifically, the Michael White, Newton's larest
Neoplatonists who influenced Renaissance biographer, reminded listeners to
alchemists most were: Plotinus (204*2ZO), BBC Radio 4 in April 1,996 that
Porphyry Q32-304) and Proclus (410-454). Newton was a black, dark figure,
The later Neoplatonists in Syria and Baghdad, an unpleasant man. He was
such as Hunayn and son, translated Plato and damaged in childhood; his father
Aristotle lor the Latin scholars in Europe in the died before he was born, his
Middle Ages. For alchemists it was their mother married again and his
cosmologies and 'elements' that appealed. In stepfather didn't like him.
Italy the most notable early Renaissance Psychological damage was done.
Neoplatonist was Marsilio Ficino who, on Newton originally went to
Cosimo de Medici's orders in 1463, rranslated train as an Anglican clergyman
not only Plato but the Hermetlc Corpus, which at Cambridge, the traditional
pro- loundly influenced Lu1l, Reuchlin,Agrippa, place for clergr to receive their Nervton's loyal
Dee and all 'magical alchemists'. See also colleague, Edmund
education. It took a long time for the University
Halley, rvho put up the
Pimander. to recover from the intellectual shock ol money fbr Newton's
Newton, who rebuilt a world of reason that had Principia to be
N::lTiil: been lost since the early Renaissance. published in 1687.
Interestingly, J.G. Crowther, historian of the
The chief transmitters olAlexandrian alchemy Cavendish Laboratory, reports that'Ner,vton's
to the Arabs, they were Syriac-speaking works were greatly esteemed but were taught
Christian followers of Nestorius, Patriarch of rather as the theologians taught the Bible'.
Constantinople, who had founded the sect in With much fact and a little fiction, Newton's
ao42B. They lvere condemned at the Council of oliicial life has been well documented:

111
 Newton. Str lsadc

. how he r,l orked on gravity, inspired by the

boy Horrocks's corrected Tables on the
Transits oJVenus, rvhich Kepler had got
THE .
slightly wrong;
how he turned to prisms and Boyle's book
on colours;

CHRONOLOGY .
.
holv he lell in and our r,vith Hooke and the
Ro1za1 SocietY;
how Halley paid for his prtnctpta to be
published (in Latin, 1682), when the dithery
OF Royal Society reneged on its promise to do
SO;
. hor,v he sat as a Member of parliament and
ANCIENT KINGDOMS everyone waited with bated breath for the
great man's speech, but all he said tvas
could the rvindorv be shut because there

AMENDED. .
was a slight draught;
horv, as Master ol the Mint, he was the
scourge of counterfeiters ;

. horv he died at 84, with all his teeth. his

eyes and hearin.q intact, and u,as buried in
To which is Prefix'd,
glory in Westminster Abbey.
A SlxoRr Crrno NrcL E fro. tbe Firfi The knorvn Newton suggests three l,vords:
Calculus, Light, Gravitation, and a r,vonderful
Memory of Things ra Europe, to tlte Conquef
equation
of Perfia, 6y Alexaoder tbe Great,
_
l-
Gm,m
d:

By Sir ISAAC NEI.Irf)N. The unknown Newton was r,vhat he hld to keep
Cambridge happy. Not ro upser the Christian
applecart, he toned down his views that
.EONDON: ancient Erypt had a supreme mathematical
and esoteric wisdom. Signiflicantly, in order to
Prinred fo, 7. Tonfon, J,Otbon, and f. Loagman ; arrive at his larvs on calculus, the composition
andSold by Meflieuri S, it b nd Bruce,Boo[fe[ers of light and universal gravitation, Newton
on the Blitd KErinDabtia. MDCCXXVIII. studied obsessively the Greek philosophers and
ancient Egvptian Hermeticists, plus masters of
Islamic thought such as Ai-Biruni, author ol
the original Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms, a
superlative history of religion and lolklore
Title-page of, Nervton's how, on his mother's Llncolnshire farm as going back ro rhe Egyprians and the Old
book thar rvas inspired
the world's worst farmer, he sowed his Testament.
by a translation ol the
Arabian alchemist calculus seeds; By 167l Newton was sure that the
Al-Biruni's Chronologt hor,v he rvatched
an apple lall (fact, says Egrptians kne',v about atoms, gravitation and
oJ'Allcient Kingdoms. Newton), and linked it to the ,push and pull, heliocentricity, and that rhe Great pyramid
of the moon; incorporated specific fractions ol latitude.

112
 FOUR ELEMENTS 1 r,q.nrH. the base
c1a1,or lertile keme' ol
alchemy. symbolized in
the pilgrim's 'dry' path
Earth, water, fire and air were the basic stufT ol the universe. created out of chaos. along rvhich he could
that could be translormed b), alchemy. reach the heights ol
translormation.
Artlst: Didnd Fernando
2 tfr.ttl,R, s1'rnbolizing alchemical flux. distillation, delr:, rivers ol lish (subcorrscious
rrcasures) and alchemv Via baprism, the 'humid' path. Artist: Didn(r Ferndndo
5 ntRE, symbolizing alchemy of firing, calcination, suiphur,
and rhe Ancient Greek
Priests of Fire. Artlst: Dlana Fernando

i
iI

r
i
4 AIR, symbolizing alchcmy via the intellect, Breath ol God. or the angelic beings ol
John Dee, Thomas \raughan and fakob Boehme. Art[st; Diana Fernando
 lvtcnotas oJ (usa

Although he wrote about Eg.pt in his

disclosure of transmutation lest the market
Ch ro n o I ogt oJ A n c i e n t K i ng cto m s A m e n cl e cl. and value of gold collapse; he was, alter all, the
touched on his admiration of ancient
Eg/ptian aurhor of The Sceptical Chemtst.
measuremenr inhis principicr, the lormer,
a Newton read alchemical texts avidly,
mere shador,r' oI AI_Biruni. \vas nor published
frequently making copious transcriptions. He
until .just after his death, and the English
owned Vaughan's translation of the
version ol principia \,vas not published until Rosicrucian Famq and he had bought a copy
1729 - 42 years afrer the original of
manuscriptl Ashmoie's Theatrum Chem[cum Br[tqnnicum
It was apparent hor,rr he had proved the
ne,,l, lor t 1.Bs.Od. in 1669. This he srudied
(calculus) by means ol the old (geometry).
ceaselessly, sprinkling ir I,vith his annotarions
In order lor Newton to keep the post of
and copying large sections out by hand. He
Prolessor of Mathematics at Cambridge,
the lound Maier's Symbola Aureae _Mensae
public theological front had to be susiained
absorbing and was particularly attracted to the
(although Newton was allor,ved not to
be last of its 12 ,sophic apostles', Michael
ordainedl. To proclaim the ancient Greeks
as Sendivogius, r,vhose own work, The New
lathers ol European civilization was fine.
But Chymtcal Lighr, Newton possessed and
rhe ancient Egyptiansl That was a very
commented on. down rhe margins. Like Boyle,
uncomfortable thought.
Newton took Eirenaeus philalethes seriously.
The secret Newton had two abiding
For 20 years, hehad The Open Entrance
passions: alchemy and theolog,. ashis
His surviving bedside book, marking every page and adding
alchemical manuscripts of over 650,OOO
wordl loose sheets of his own comments on the
prove him ro be an adept, having
assimilated alchemical experiments he had perlormed
the essence ol alchemical literature.
The greater according to Eirenaeus.
part of his time at Cambridge was
spenr urong Newton's profound theological occupation
retorts and furnaces in his oln laboratory
thai was with the One, with Divine Unity as
he had equipped himselL
revealed in nature. His alchemical aspirations
His nepher,v, Dr Humphrey Newton, who
led him to brooding explorarion of the Bible,
r'vas his assistant lrom 1685 until
1690. particularly the prophets, the Book ol Daniel,
describes how he would start the Great
Work at and the Apocalypse. His Interpretatlons oJ the
the Spring Equinox at J am and again
another Prophecies and other theological writings
Operation in autumn at ,Fall of ye Leal
each amounting b 1.25 million words lying in the
session lasting about six weeks in his
Maynard Keynes Collection are largely ,unwepl,
Elaboratory, the Fire scarcely goin.q out
either unhonoured, and unsung,. See also Boyle;
nighr or day. he siring up one Nighr. as
ldid Eirenaeus philalerhes.
anorher, till he had linished his Chvmical
Experiments'. Newton did this with such
exactness and pains that Humphrey
*i:PlT'1,!l?
thought !!?o! ?i)
'he aimed at something beyond
ye neach ol Born Nicholas Krebs ofKues (Cues or Cusa),
humane Art and Industry,.
near Trier in the Rhineland, this philosophical
Newton himself intimated that ,such a alchemist studied law at Heidelberg, then
secret was not to be communicated rvithout
graduated from padua in 1418, before taking
immense damage to ye rvorld, if there
r,vould be the cloth.
any veritl, in ye Hermetic ,,vriters,. Newton
Nicholas rvas a brilliant mathematician and
hoped that Boyle wouldn't split. Although
intuitive astronomer who believed in a
Boyle was sympathetic to Newton,s alchemy,
heliocentric world almost a century belore
and indeed, with Newton, had petitioned
Copernicus but who was never charged with
Parliament to bring in a bill forbidding the
heresy since he never set out to prove anything

113
 Ntcholas o;f Cusa
$
{
;ii
i
scientifically. He merely guotes Boethius with Outlvardly, Nicholas stayed well within the I
,ii
approval: 'Knowledge of divine things is bournes ol Christianity, even becoming a
$
impossible without mathematics.' Cardinal. But his interior lile was that of a 'gr
A
His insights are uncannily modern: space is spiritual alchemist.
$
infinite, it is neither up nor down; the earth He observed that all creeds and races of ,-.{

spins on its own axis and it turns around the mankind - Greeks, Latins, Arabs, .[ews and ii
sun. Moreover, the myriad stars observable Scythians - worshipped the same truth. From ;i'

Nicholas of Cusa in his with the naked eye are in themselves solar his vantage-point in Trier and Padua (1ong the 11

$,
monastic scriptorium systems with their own planets. seat ol philosophy and medical thought in .i+

ltaly), Nicholas rubbed shoulders with lewish t

$
lawyers, Arabic scientists and Christian doctors t
and ecclesiasts, noting how their dilferent $
.i!
laiths operated. He even accepted circumcision $
and idolatry as valid, provided that their ir
symbolic truths were remembered. I
Like William of Ockham before him,
Nicholas regarded scholasticism as more -:!
il'
harmlul than helpful to theolo$/. His famous l

book De Docta lgnorantia (On Learned

Ignorance, a paradoxical disclaimer ol his
beliels to avoid attack by the Inquisition,
perhaps) draws on Maimonides's GuideJor the
Perplexed ln his conviction that the
'conclusions' one arrives at through reason are
the same as those one arrives at through
revealed truth.
Nicholas lounded a library at Cusa where
scholars would go on pilgrimages. There is a
record of Bishop Dalberg, friend ol the
alchemist Trithemius, leading Reuchlin and
party in 1496 on an expedition to inspect the
two most important and rare libraries in
cermany - that of Nicholas of Cusa, and that
of Trithemius of Spanheim 'their course was
lrom Worms to Oppenheim ... by boat to
Coblenz and up the Moselle to Cues', stopping
to inspect the precious manuscripts from the
Greek, Hebrew and Arab masters before
journeying on over the hi11s to Kreuznach and
Spanheim.
Nicholas's avant-garde work, The Vision oJ
God, postulating that you cannot parcel out
God with reason alone any more than you can
pin down the universe (God is not the same as
his divine attributes, but transcends them) was
translated by Dr lohn Everard (1582-1640) -
who also translated the Pimander - in the
 Nosologia Harmonia

1630s. His Vlslon was appreciated more bv

the
humanists of seventeenth-century nngland
than the pedagogues of filteenth_century
Germany.

Norton, Thomas
(b. lilteenth cenrury, Bristol)

An English alchemist who is seen through his

works and the enthusiasm of others, notablv

-ffi
Ashmole and Michael Maier. The first entry
in
Elias Ashmole's Theatrum Chemicum
Brltann[cum (1652) is Norton's Ordinall.

N"*::.s:: H:::r:i: AX/

A large alchemical collection published in 1615 Sr)
and 1 61 6 by Henry petreus of Marburg. He
operated under the great patron of the Calvinisr
/#)
University of Marburg, Moritz of Hesse_Kassel, S,k
<l
who supported Rosicrucian alchemists and
physicians, such as Michael Maier. oswald sayA
Croll had been a student there in the 1520s.

$nis fucelle
Alchemical cosmologr, in a rvork ascribed to
Norton Inaru
CHA
 o-

O is a paradox of symbols;
O is the symbol ol eternal recurrence, without
beginning or end;
O is the ouroboros, lvhose end is in its
beginning;
O is oneness;
O is zero;
O is omega, the end;
O is the full moon;
O is the sun;
O is the halo behind a sainr; tr'tan in the cosmos, on a cube of earth. under the moon,
r,r,irhin the sphere of the sun.
O is the world, the universe, the globe; !:
li.
O is the metallic alumen, aluminium; ri.
O is the Platonic so1id, the sphere; Odo, Abbot of Cluny \926-e4z\.. ,i

O is the mathematical circle. the most $

complete shape; A shadowy mystic, the second Abbot ol Clunv t
and creator ol its fame, was a pupil of St
,+l

O is the chivalric Round Table: 1

O is the humanistic container of man; Remigius of Auxerre, Rheims and Paris. A

O is the architectural dome, the oast house, Hebrew and Latin scholar and interpreter of the
the Round Torver, the orchestra, the arena, O1d Testament, Odo became Abbot ol the

the 'wooden O', the circus, the alchemical Burgundian Abbey of C1uny, rvhich had been
theatre or basilica; founded by esoteric master-builders who
O ls alchemical gold, perfecrion. understood the secrets of alchemical
translormation.
See also Uroboros.
He made frequent trips over the Alps to
Italy, and it is surmised that he had regular
The creation of the rvorld,
contact rvith the Hermetic Brotherhood ol the
alrer a filteenrh-cenrury
uroodcut. Comacenes, .ur,hose ancestors had insulated
themselves in the middle olLake Como ro
escape the decrees against magic by Diocletian.
The Comacenes studied Sacred Geometry and
influenced architecture all over western Europe
lrom the time of Charlemagne ro the lounding
olthe first Gothic cathedral, Cluny, in 1095.
Odo would have exchanged knorvledge with
them on the art of translormational building,
even though he.,r,as 150 years too soon to
lvitness the great new cathedral grow on the
site of his abbey.

116
 Ordinall

9yd:ad Roman physician Celsus, Origen quotes an

Ophite liturgy in which each Archon is invoked
The eight early Egrptian gods ol the
citv of in turn. Far lrom putting off his readers,
Hermopolis. Thoth or Hermes
lpatron ol Origen's passages whetted the appetite for
alchemy) was called the Master ol the the
City of very cult against which he was inveighing.
Eight, the Ogdoad. The eight over which His
he Agctinst Celsus tvas in danger of being more
presided rvere four pairs ol primordial
cleities: popular than his Hexapla, a six_language
Night, Obscurity, Secret and Eternity. These
adaptation ol the old Tesramenr. Behind the
dim and distant deities, frog_ or r.rp.nt_
r,l ork of this seemly Christian
headed, represented chaos emerging eunuch lav a
from the sorcerer's handbook for the magus and curious
Kemi, black Nile,s slime of crearion.
alchemist.

oslu:
oul:1
The Gothic cathedral arch. supported
more bv Meaning 'the maker of works, or ,the Creator,.
pillars, Iess by walls. The quirky historian,
the r,vord was used by Cornelius Agrippa in
Hendrik van Loon, believes the Gothic the
arch was Third Book of his Occult philosophy ro reler
Muslim-inspired, with its special vaulted ro
space God the One Supreme Creator who is bevond
having transformational effects on those ajl
who lvorlds, even beyond the r,vorld of angelk spirits
stand beneath it.
who can be called up through celestial magic.

oly,"lid::::
One ol the oldest Greek alchemists, along rvith
9P-:liT 1 l:l"i' !:ti:::l:l ::TiIl
A remarkable rypographer and printer of
Zosimos, who practised the crafts of
alchemical and medical works in Sr,vitzerland.
metallurgv, chrysopoeia and glass_cutting.
He He was paracelsus's pupil who transcribed
wrote a tract on The Sacred Art, which the
was sage's rvords. As Oporinus maintained,
basically a commentary on Zosimos as
the Paracelsus always used to dictate his work,
'crown of philosophers who preaches
union and this so rapidly that ,you,d think it was rhe
lvith the Divine and disdainful rejection
of devil speaking in himt'
matter'.
He \,vas a friend of the great anatomist
Vesalius, whose De Humani Corporis Fabriccr
9rlt1:: Llbri Septem he typeset and printed (Basel,
1543.).
A Gnostic sect arising in the early Christian
era.
The Church Father, Origen of Alexandria
(ao185-254) launched a fierce artack
on Celsus !rdinall
the pagan, who defended the sect. Their
basic This alchemical narrative was ,,yritten in 1477.
beliel was bound up with their cosmolog,
of, a in rhyming couplets, by Thomas Norton, a
world surrounded by the snake Leviathan;
a student of George Ripley. The title has a
r'vorld therefore enclosed in its own ,barrier
of religious connotation: a service book of
evil', a tvorld lrom lvhich it was possible to
alcheml, - a Crede-Mihi. The poem is a
escape only by blasphemous imprecations
to progressive description ol the stages ol
Christ and invocations and magical passr,vords the
Great Work, leading to 'or<lination' (blessed,
to the Archons or entities that guarded the
transformed state).
gates of each sphere through which
the soul Extraordinarily, it was lirst published in a
might ascend. In his impassioned attack on
the Latin verse translation by Michael Maier as one
 cffil, ,i , -,"iiW
unatnRe. or PnJ/stc tt?fined

'r :'.; '" a- . = ll

Einsiedeln, the
birthplace of Paracelsus,
shorving the
Benedictine monastery.

of his three Golden Trtpod tracts (Lucas Jennis, his songs, Amphion raised the walls of Thebes,
1 6 1 8). Then
lennis published it again in 162b the city of initiation. Orpheus gave life to
in German verse. It was not published in its numbers, and he sailed as an Argonaut to
original English until Ashmole gave it pride oi Colchis, the land of initiates. Through losing
place in his Theqtrum Chemicum Britannicum his wile Euridice in death he suffered, became
of 1652. Ashmole explains in his Introduction victim of his chastity and was brutalized by
how Maier had come over to England expresslv Bacchantes.
to pick up a copy of Norton's Ordinall and to The Orphic cult developed from this. It
learn English well enough to be able to explained the mixture olgood and evil in
translate it into Latin. Ashmole praised this human nature. Like Pythagoreanism, it taught
1OO-page alchemical poem of the trials and
tribulations of an alchemist. It is unlikely that
Ordinqll would enjoy the same accolades today. Orpheus, after the frontispiece of a Spanish lute
tablature.
See also Ashmole; lennis; Maier; Norton.

Oriatrike, or Physic Refined

1l3li3i: 13-iil
The English version by lohn Chandler of the
Ortus Medicinae of lan Baptista Van Helmont,
the'gas'man.

OTT::
The mythical Orpheus was able to transform
the woods and wildernesses of Greece and
enchant animals, birds and fish with the
harmony from the seven strings of his 1yre. To

118
 Ortus Med[clnae

the transmigration of souls and moral purity.

Jewish and Greek. \iVith his Greek hat he
Later the Orphic cult degenerated into
stressed orthodoxy; rvith his Hebrew hat he
sacrilicial rituals, that included the tearing
stressed orthopraxy.
apart and devouring of animals.
Ultimately, philo favoured the latter. insofar
By the time of the Renaissance, Orpheus
as God's Word, 'verbum', was word, and
was treated as sorcerer and enchanter. Ascribed
deed/conduct.
to him, as to Solomon, was knowledge ol
herbs, minerals, ,celestial medicine' and the
Philosopher's Stone.
oltroflmnlc
Pico stared inhis Cabalistic Concluslons that
Having three unequal axes at right angles to
the Hymns of Orpheus had as much power
as each other; an adjective describing the
the Psalms ol David to induce higher states
ol particular structure and shape ol sulphur
being. Clearly Renaissance alchemists looked
crystals, in relation to certain musical notes
beyond Neoplatonism to plato himself,
that cause them.
grthagoras, Orpheus and Egupt for their
It has long been suspected that sounds can
philosophy and magic.
alter cell structure, and some composers, such
as Bach, have long known that musical
Orthelius, Andreas vibrations can be translated into the crvstal
i:i:lv ::t:i*:h ::l::vl forms of certain elements such a, salt, mercury
and sulphur. Rudolf Steiner and his followers
An acolyte olMichael Sendivogius, the polish
have spoken of an energ, recognized as ,sound
alchemist should not be confused with
]ohn or chemical ether'. For music therapists this
Dee's Dutch geographer friend, Ortelius).
has immense possibilities for attuning the
Orthelius commented on and illustrated the
body. They see rhe three archetypal concepts in
great Pole's -A,rovum Lumen Chymtcum in
the music - rhythm, melody and harmony in
German edition (philip Wittel, Erfurt, 1624\. -
terms of the three alchemical principles of salt,
Onhelius's ligures and commenraries on rhis
mercury and sulphur, respectively, which in
same work of Sendivogius were also published
turn have special crystal shapes relating to
rn Zetzner's Theatrum Chemicum (1624) and
in man. Cubic salt relates to man,s body,
German in Manget's Bibliotheca Chemlca
tetrahedal mercury to his spirit and rhomboidal
Curiosa (1702).
sulphur to his soul. Thus do the crystals have
orthelius' delighrlul little woodcuts of the affinities wirh the platonic solids ol
alchemical Operation are more in the stvle ol
Pythagoras.
sixteenth- than seventeenth-century Geiman
illustrations. Graphic and simple, the tZ
pictures divide into three groups of four, ?:!!:,:!::::::
demonstrating, first, the influences of the lower The title Ortus tttedicinae lSource ol Medicine)
realms (e.9. earth) on the making of the Stone; was given ro rhe collecred works ol
lan Baprista
second, the influences of, the upper realms Van Helmont (1STT-1644), the Flemish
(sun, moon, stars) on the Stone; and third, physician-alchemist, by his son Franciscus
the
making of the polvder ol projection. Mercurius. Unfortunately, Van Helmont wrote
in such an obscure style that by the time his
oilh?l:::v son had waded through all his father's
manuscripts and prepared them lor publication
In alchemy, Right Conducr (Jewish slant), as as Ortus l,(edlcina, Vel Opera et Opuscula
opposed ro Orthodoxy, Righr Opinion (creek omnia (1648 and 1659), his father was dead.
slanQ. Philo olAlexandria wore two hats: See also Chlorophyll; Oriatrike; Van Helmont.

119
 Br,H.9.-
C-: ----q[4 Ost(tnes

f (-- .'.':{,
o:lii::
There are several alchemists ol this
name, the best known being the
third-century ec Persian
alchemist, reputed b), Plin), to
have introduced magic
among the Greeks r,vhen he
accompanied Xerxes on his
expeditions in the Graeco-
Persian wars.
He apparently talked
about the 'Baetylos', the
'Stone with a soul' and the
'Stone that has a spirit' to be
found on the banks of the Nile.
The Greeks later adopted this idea of
divine stones, llthol empsychoi. These stones,
set up in holy places, lvere revered and A rather grand, three-tier or,en (inspired by the
decorated by the general public; in private introductory emblem in the Boort aJLambspring\.

hands, they r'vere used for dir,ination and

magic and associated rvith the herm.
An ostanes is included, along rvith ozVmTydias-
Stephanos, as one ol the early Alexandrian
alchemists in the Coryus Hermeticum. This A legendary king ol Egypt, actually King
particular Ostanes wrote on tincturing, and the Rameses II (1290 1224ec), the greatest tempie-
colouring of metals. In The Divine and Sdcred builder in all Egvpt's history. Rameses I1 is said
,4rr he Iisted the materials that made up the to have possessed the secret of the Magnum
'Divine Water', which is said 'to raise the dead Opus. He had a monument to himsell
and destroy the living'. A fer,v drops ol it r,vould constructed, rvhich r,t as surrounded by a
make lead take on the nature ol gold, God circular rvall in solid gold, 365 cubits in
r,villin.ql Among the Arabian treatises, a Book oJ :
circumference (1 cubit 46cml1Bin).
ostanes turned up with the lltorks oJGiber. Shelley's sonnet (opposite) represents not
the actual history, but the spirit ol
o::ri:l ozymandias. The huge statue ol Rameses II
that lies shattered in giant pieces over the
The name given to any one of the acids used in courtlzard ol the Rameseum (the mortuary
the processes of transmuting ordinary gold and temple complex) is what inspired Shelle1,, if
ordinary silrrer into their philosophic only by Oro*r.
counterparts. The 'Stomach of the ostrich' was
capable of digesting anything.

O.r"_1

The alchemical lurnace or athanor, rvhich used

slow-burning coke or dung lor the first
Operation, calcination.

120
 € -'o:-
Ozrlmndms

Ozymandias
Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of
stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the
sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose
frolvn
And r,vrinkled lip and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor rvell those passions read

The lone and level sands stretch far awav.

,\'lunrm.1. of Rameses II. Shelley.s poem retlects not so much the

historical realitl, of the alchemist king as
the lutilir)r ol rryerbearing
tvlann\r.

121
 through the marriage in 1613 ol Frederick V,
Elector Palatine, to Elizabeth, daughter of
James I ol England, and alchemically, through
Andreae's Chymical Weddtng (Srrasburg, 1616)
and a host ol other books. So a Netv Age r,vas
Palatinate heralded, uniting England and the Rhine in an
alchemical wedding, conducted by Hermetic
The German Rhineland province in lvhich adepts. Sadly, all this .,vas shattered by the
flourished a sort of seventeenth-century Thirnr Years' \,Var (1618-48).
alchemical Nerv Age. Alternative cults boomed
- the Rosicrucians, the Bohemiam Brethren. the
Famlly of Love - was governed by the "111ls:_n"'-i'
sympathetic dukes of the palatinate and nearby Regeneration; the art ofbringing a plant back
Hesse, Wrirttemberg and Bohemia. to lile irom lts ashes. Paracelsus held that
when a physical entity is destroyed, its visible
'astral' lorm remains.
Experimenting rvith dead florvers on
blottlng-paper, Paracelsus did, in eff'ect, rvhat
every child does to make mustard seed sprout,
or rvhat twentieth-century ES/ptologists have
done to bring mummified roses back to life. See
}.|ukflart€(6 also Booz.

'11
The Palatinate Much alchemical
literature .,vas
published by the
astonishing De Bry
family, which would
have been blnned by
the uneasy James i in
England or Catholic
Italy or Spain.
Alchemists. such as
rhe German Michael
Maier the English
Robert Fludd and .[ohn
Dee, lvho spent three The son olMercury was popularized into folk-
years angel-magicking alchemy as the transforming power ln nature.
his way round His head and body form the hieroglyph ol rhe
Bohemia, actually l\,lercury of the Philosophers, at once solar and
thought a 1unar. The star on the right is the hieroglyph
transformation of lor harmoniac salt, the third component ol the
mankind would be Alchemical Art, the component of transforming
possible: physically, matter.

122
 paracelsus

o:"d:::: House of Baumast. philippus Aureolus

Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim,
Medical compendia by Syriac and Arabian
called Paracelsus, was brought up in deep piety
scholars, r,vritten betlveen the lifth and eighth
and yet wirh high aspirarions ibr healing
centuries. Full ol astrological and alchemical
humanity. He learned his early lore from his
Iore, they rvere typical of pre_lslamic and
father, a herbalist and physician. His morto,
Arabian learning. The best knor,vn pandects
'Learn and learn, and ask and ask,
rvere byAhron, a Christian priest_physician and be not
in ashamed,' never left him, any more than his
Alexandria just belore the rise ol tslam.
other guiding rule, ,Learn and help,.
Probably originally in Greek, Ahron,s panclects
He picked up everything he could of ancient
lvere evidently translated into Syriac, before
Greek learning, medical science, metallurg, and
being translated into Arabic by the persian
Iew, alchemy, and received his doctorate at Ferrara
Masarjawaih, at rhe Academy of
Jundeshapur, in 1515. He rvas a prodigious itinerant figure,
the seat of the new Islamic learning. See also
knocking do,"vn false pretensions to learning
fundeshapur; Syriac. r,vhere',,er he r,yent, and yg1 he tvas constantlv
healing, comforting and helping the sick and
:llv-*: needy. All humanity rvas his rvorkshop.
He travelled far and rvide over Europe, if his
A number of Egrptian papyri with alchemlcal
own records are to be believed: Spain, portugal,
content have been preserved, the oldest being
found at Luxor in 1B7J by Georg Ebers, and
thought to date to around 155Onc, with text
referring even further back to Imhotep,
€W /*(e Yaracelsus' signature'

architect to King Zoser ofthe Third Dynasty,

and later identilied with the alchemist_healer
Esclepius. It rvas thought that hieroglyphics
were the script of the mysteries. Renaissance
alchemists and thinkers such as Giordano
Bruno, sarv the revival of the true magical
Egyptian religion as a means of reuniting
Christendom. See also Esclepius; Leyden
Papyrus.

'11i:"I": !y?? _!'.r)).

Arguably rhe greatest alchemist cf a1l rimes.
'Alu,ays drunk and always 1ucid,,
this irregular
ffi:
'\N5
sixteenth-century Srviss vagrant was turled out
of seats ol learning by one outraged doctor Disease as a
alter another, yet he was posthumouslv scourge of
God.
idolized.
Born in the small village of Einsiedeln,
signilicant for its pilgrimages and its Black
Madonna, he was the only child ol a pious
Disease. probablv The journex- through
peasant mother, whose lamily lived on local
syphills. death symbolicallv
Benedictine Abbey land, and Wilhelm van representing alchemical
Hohenheim, a bastard son of the Sr,rrabian transmutation

127
Paracelsus

France, England, Germany, Srveden, Moscow, perfect state; He has charged the miners
Poland, Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Italy, u,ith the task ol relining it. In the same way,
Rhodes, Crete, Constantinople and Alexandria. He enioined the phl,sician to purily man's
He was an army surgeon in the Netherlands body, lrom rvhich purificatlon man emerges
and in Denmark. He treated and conversed as indestructible as go1d. This is an action
with the highborn and rhe lorvly alike - whlch, like that perlormed by lire on gold,
gypsies, monks and peasants, no less lhan lrees man from the impurities that he
abbots, princes and knights. himsell does not knolv. And it is like such
In the midst ol such exploits he dropped in lire that medicine should act.
at the best universities, Paris, Oxlord, Cologne,
vienna, Padua and Bologna, gleaning all the The basic idea ol purilying gold ol its dross
latest in medical practice and constantly underlies the rvhole Paracelsan universe.
stirring up trouble u,ith his criticism ol time- Paracelsus's greatest achievement is in using
honoured ideas and his inspired experiments in alcheml, for medicine not gold-making. He is
r,vound-surgery and antisepsis. He scorned the lorerunner ol not only homeopathy, but
stuf$r academics and traditional doctors rvho antisepsis, microchemistry, and chemotherapy.
based their cures on the theories ol ancient It was not the artificial extraclion ol gold out ol
Greek physicians such as Galen or Arelaeus. baser metals. but the higher chemistry by
Significantly, he was ca11ed the Luther of rvhich substances were 'translated' that consti-
Physicians, not only lor his rer,,olutionary tuted Paracelsus's gold-making. lust as the
medicine but also for his religious intensily. He spirit induced changes in the soul and body by
saw the tragedl, ol human lile as rve11 as the impressing its 'nature' or signature on them, so
g1ory. He sarv himsell as lhe lnstrument ol God alchemical gold elfected changes in its earth-
and as the patient, too. He mixed rvith al1 bound counterpart, in diseased bodies.
humanity'but sau, himsell as an outsider. '1 am \regetable and animal lile equally could be
different; let this not upset you,' are his transmuted, even as grapes turned into wine or
startling words in his 'Credo' olhis Astronomia milk into butterl
l,lagna. Paracelsus's approach rvas alchemical; In the course of his eccentric lile, Paracelsus
he perlormed a kind ol'vital chemistry' in u,rote voluminously - or rather, dictated in a
r,vhich God was e\rer present. 'tbr God Himself mocking mixture of dog-Latin and German to
is the true physician and the true medicine'. his students. In spite ol distortions,
His lgboratory rvas indeed his orator1,, and God simplicities, old wives' tales and diatribes
'enjoined the physician to fight against the against the 'loul sculleries' of apothecaries and
'bel1y-crarvling' doctors, his works are
transience ol things'. Paracelsus described
man's nature as determined by his three strangely modern and rivetingly' eloquent.
bodies: elemental, emotional and spiritual, and Roughly hali are medical/astrological/
all bodies are interrelated - man, earth, cosmos alchemical and hall are theological.
Nothing r,vas edited or collected in his
- ro God.
The treatment ol the plague, gout, syphilis,
lilerime - the handnrriting is turbulently
obscure on the survlving manuscripts' For
epilepsy - all diseases - are sacred tasks, just
somebodl, rvho, in his olvn words' is 'not
as much as preparing herbs, smelting metals,
subtly spun' and not educated to spin silk,
analysing salts in mineral waters. Moreover, ,:l
Paracelsus's writing is phenomenal. His
God has crealed all things in their raw state to
Astronomia Magna and his Philosophia Magna ;
be used and taken to their next stage by man:
are vast rambling outpourings on the nature ol t
God is the Great Physician r,vho,
the universe, God, and divine operations:
created the ore but did not carn'it to its alchemical, astrological and medical.

124
 appear: the many-coloured surlace on the
'":?lo* molten metals heralding the nearness ol the
A seemingly absurd statement or phenomenon
final stage of translormation and meaning that
a contradiction in terms that holds a truth.
the volatile parts of the residue rvere sublimed.
Alchemically, it is the reconciliation ol
opposites via Hermes the creative imagination.
Hermes is himsella paradox, being both
quicksilver, a metal-based substance, and
':_t::1i
A special still lor cohobation, so called lor
mercury, a liquid, volatile essence. From
obvious reasons, alchemical and ornithological,
Hermes and Aphrodite u,as born the
and for less obvious reasons: mythical.
hermaphrodite, the man-woman, combining
According to a nvelfth-century bestiary, the
the male and lemale principle in the highesi
pelican's name derives lrom its habitat on the
stage of the alchemical process into \\,holeness.
Nile in Egypt, which in Greek is Canopos.
The Philosopher's Stone is paradoxically called
the hydrolith, the waterstone, the .stone that
is Double pelican
no stone'. It is base yet noble, immature section
Vet
perflect, cheap yet precious.
The basic tenet of the alchemical Operation
is that parts are broken down in order to
be put
together again : separation before unification.
In modern terms. the goal olthe alchemist r,rras
to heal rhe split in consciousness between the
conscious Ego and the unconscious Intuition.
The lvay to do it tvas to differentiate the
opposites, then to express both sides in one
ornithological alchemical mvthical
breath, and finally to raise and therebv
transform the vibrations above the spiit.

Although the female kills her

1,oung in self_
defence when they attack her r,yith their
'?:7i"ul fledgling wings, she resuscitates them three
Percival's quest lor the Holy Grail is the
days later rvith blood from her breast lvhich she
alchemist's quest for the philosopher,s Stone.
pierces for them.
The legend of perclval has mysterious origins.
In the thirteenth century Wolftam van
Eschenbach's poem parzival the Grail is a
stone, guarded by celebate initiates. parzirral
"l:i:l:
The five-pointed star, symbol of man, the
ll,anders all over Spain and the Middle East in
microcosm, as compared with the slx_pointed
search ol it, guided by ,Conduit_Armour,, rhe
slar of Solomon, sl,mbol of the uniyerse or
female psychopomp, just as the medieval
macrocosm. pentacles rvere used by magicians
alchemists searched for the Stone that would
belore starting a magical conjuration, and by
bring them the elixlr oflife.
alchemists to illustrate Hermeric books. They
were particularly popular in Renaissance
manuals, r,';here rvould-be adepts lound it
':1:o:k easier to assimilate alchemical theory through
A bird that symbolizes volatility, as do all
diagram than text.
winged creatures. Near the end of the
In the design lor his Great Seal of Hermes,
alchemical Operation the ,peacock,s tail, r,vould
lohn Dee has a pentacle at its centre. Dee

I )<
Periplus

believed this asrro-alchemical hieroglyph had Hermdt[qtc and Fables Egtptiennes et Greqtrcs
porverlul healing eflects on the mind and that, Devoildes, in rvhich he reduces all myth to
',vhen contemplated, it could bring about alchemical interpretation. In his Dictionary
wondrous inner translormations. See also Dee: Pernety lists 12 successive processes in the
Dei; Hermes. Great Work, rvhich are represented by the 12
signs of the zodiac as lollolrrs:

':iifT: 1 Calcination Y Aries, the Ram

Initiarion b), stages, u,hereby adepts had to
move from one holy place to another, as on a
pilgrimage, each rime becoming more
Congelation Y Taurus, the Buli

enlightened. The Greek philosophers rvere

required to visit the Egvprian temples before
Fixation X Gemini, the T,,l,ins

they could move up the scale of initiation;

alchemists journeyed to Chartres or St James
4 Solution G cancer, the Crab

(St Jacques, Santiago) of Compostela, where the

r,,ibrations coming through the earth seemed to
Digestion SI Leo, the Lion

have a special transformational lorce. See also

Compostela.
Distillation
W Virgo, the Virgin

Sublimation
= Libra, the Scales

":1'1':
Royal or papal permits lvere granted to
Separation flf scorlio, the Scorpion
alchemists to allow rhem to practise 'the
philosophic art ol the conversion of metals'. In
Ceration +, Sagiuarius, the Archer

England, the mad young Klng Henry VI

(reigned 1422 71') granted a permir to lohn
1O Fermentation
w Capricornus, the Goat

Cobbe and lohn Mistelden to make alchemical @

1t Multipllcarion Aquarius, the
gold. This \\ras approved by Parliamentl
\iVater-carrier
Proriding the gold came the King's way, he did
not appear to question hor,v it was acquired.
t2 Projection 00 Pisces, the Fish

Not so his grandfather, Henry IV, rvho, in 1404

A number of other alchemists divide the
had passed an Act banning the 'multiplying ol
processes leading to the Philosopher's Stone
metals' as a crime againsr the Crorvn. Alchemy
into 12, for instance, Ripley, Mylius and
must have been rife in the Middle Ages to have
Valentine. See also Magnum Opus.
attracted the attention of so manv monarchs
and popes.

Ai::i':- !71'??i?:"1i:1il:
Il-111'Ir l"':!h 0'll -!lo!) A seventeenth-century philosopher from
An elusive abb6 who, having rerurned lrom his Hamburg, whose coat-of-arms is replete lvith
chaplaincy in the Falkland Isles, became alchemical symbolism. The shield, in the shape
librarian to Frederick the Great. He retired ro of a philosopher's egg, contains Mercury 'lixed'
Avignon, keeping a lorv prolile during the on his right side by a hear,y weight and rising
French Rerrolution, rvhile he researched avidly up, 'r,olatile', on his lelt side rvith the aid ol
and gullibly into procuring the Philosopher's little rvings attached to his left ankle and rvrist.
Stone. He compiled a Dictlonna[re Mytho- Huge r,vings soar up aborre the crest over the

126
 philosophic trtercury, Salr
and Sulphur -..' ' -.. ))

egg, enclosing the seven_pointed star of,the

and 40 nights to lifetimes), and endless
seven planets and seven metals. Sylvcr
laboratory accounts of Operations. There r,vas
Phllosophorum (The Grove ofthe philosophers)
no such thing as a control experiment. No
is Petraeus's book on alchemv.
account is consistent rvith any other, either in
method or end product. The Stone can appear

lhlP "l *"!::? o:i, gl in myriad gulse as a powcler or tincture, as a

"f l, lli cube, as a flying boulder, as ccral.
Jewish thinker, religious teacher and mystic, 1) The Making of the Stone: the basic idea is
r'vho had an enormous influence on spiritual
to extract impurities from ordinary matter
alchemy. He inherited borh the
.|ewish_ Qtrima materia) and reconstitute it in its perlect
Kabbalistic tradition of north Egrpt and the
state. To complicate the issue, etery thing has
Pythagorean-platonic method ol inquiry into
its own Stone, which is the peak or purilied
divine reality. Most of his treatises are
form of itself; but the Stone for making gold is
expositions on the pentateuch, but with a
the ultimate aim, and this is where tvritings
strong sense ol the mystic presence ol God in
become woolly, lor few have achieved it, and
the individual soul. The Scriptures are
adepts' lips are sealed.
allegories of man,s soul and the translormation
2) 'The Using ol the Stone': the Stone was
it must undergo to experience Goil within, as used as a transmuting agent, whereby the
opposed to God 'out there, in the ordinary 'potency' of the Stone could be ,multiplled,
up
rvorld, tvhich is rather ,a
reflection ol Cod,s to thousands of times in impure substances as,
attrlbutes, an image ol Him,. philo's method ol
lor instance, potentizing in homeopathy. For
soul-training was knorvn as ,Askesis'.
Paracelsus, this had enormous possibiiities in
medicine. Sick people could be translormed by
r|jlg or n{fus tinctures and powders lrom the Stone that had
been alchemically produced. See also Gold;
A first-century phoenician rvho epitomized and
Magnum Opus; philosophic Mercury, Salt and
translated into Greek some of the works of an
Sulphur; Potency; powder of projection;
anclent priest, Sanchunation, who, he claimed,
Valentine.
lived long belore the Tro.ian War. He lound
connections betrveen phoenician, Egrptian and
r:_l:ury: r_ul:
Greek myths, from which stemmed masonic
and alchemical rituals and allegories, such as
'11::'lnl: :11 ?lltT:
In alchemy, these substances bore very little
rhe relationships betrveen klng/sun son and
- resemblance to the natural substances ol those
the hermaphrodite/bisexual Mercury _ Hermes.
names I Rather, they were transmuted _ if not
Hermes in early phoenician times, no less than
imaginar;, qualities attributed to substances
in both Greek and Eg/ptian myth, \,vas
Qtrima mater[a e.g. ordinary silver, ordinary
regarded as a god and a sage-inventor. See
also gold and ordinary mercury) used lor making
Hermaphrodite.
the Stone after the grosser physical properties
had been removed.
Broadly speaking. philosophic Mercury
'lll::.lr-i::1:," stood for lusible/metallic/volatile properties (or
The Magnum Opus or Great Work of the
silver, the feminine); philosophic Sulphur for
alchemist was to find or make the
fiery/inflammable/volarile properties (go1d, the
Philosopher's Stone and then to use it as a
masculine); and philosophic Salt for non-
transmuting agent or menstruum. Alchemical fl ammable/fixed properties (the unifyin.q
literature through rhe ages is littered with principle).
allegories of seekers of the Stone (from 40 days
Since earliest rimes ir was believed rhar rhe

127
t'
ir,.- ' -- Philostratus
rl
.')t.;
l'\.

rvorld of matter had divine origins. The ancient charge of sorcery made by a rival philosopher,
Greeks sau, matter as made up ol the four Euphrates. Philostratus rvrites in detail about
elements. Aristotle relined this theoryr, saying the link betrveen Apollonius and the alchemist-
that these elements rvere arranged in pairs ol magicians ol Babr4on and Susa and Indian
opposites, lire and rvater, earth and air, u,hich Brahmins. He writes down various astrological,
r'lere specially ponerlul combinations; but they medicinal and alchemical practlces of the
could mingle rvith each other, producing matter Brahmins. Apoilonius apparently had the
according to the mixture of elements that \\,as power to cure the sick and revive the dead. and
r,vithin them. Air and \\,ater produced lusible like great Prospero, could rule orrer demons,
metals lrom the \,apours. rvhile lire and earth rvorking miracles.
produced 'earthy smoke', thence stones and Throughout the A,liddle Ages, alchemists set
minerals. much laith in Philostratus's biography and
The eighth- to tenth-century Arabian considered Apollonius the loremost and rvisesl
alchemists relined this notion further: air-urater magus.
combinations made up mercury, and fire-earth
combinations made up sulphur. From these Phl:sm1
tn,o stemmed all metals and minerals.
The medieval Latin alchemists embroidered Another ol Paracelsus's descriptions ol
still more on the sulphur-mercury theoryI. With Philosophic Mercury:
their thirst fbr correspondences ('as above, so
The three principles from which all things
be1ou,'), to the se\,en metals the1, assigned the
are born and generated are: phlegma, lat
seven planets, rvhile to mercury and sulphur
and ash. The phlegma is Mercurius, the fat
the1, assigned man's spirit and soul. It n as
is Sulphur and the ash is Sa1t. For that
Paracelsus in rhe sixteenth century rvho added
u,hich smokes and evaporates over the fire,
the idea ol'sal': 'Heaven and earth have been
in the burning of u,ood, is l\tercury; that
created out ol nothingness, but they 21s
u,hich flames and is burnt is Sulphur; and
composed of three things mercurius, sulphur
ali ash is Salr.
and sal'. Mercury is the 'essence', salt is the
'body' or 'ashesj and sulphur the 'oil' ciinging See also Philosophic A,lercury, Salt and
to the mercury/. Thus a fantastical Trinity u,as Sulphur.
introduced into alchemical minds. In their
experiments. the Arabians had already lound rnlosilf-n
that mercury and sulphur did not produce a
metal, but cinnabar (mercuric sulphide), the red A substance supposedly contained in a1l
porvder rhey endowed n ith magical properties combustible bodies that escaped on burning,
in gold-making. So gre\,v the notion ol magical u,hile the calx or ash remained. Alchemists
or 'philosophic' metals, rvith salt as the about Georg Stahl, who invented the term
unilying principle. See also Cinnabar; Dew; phlogiston (Greek 'phlogizo', 'set on lire') in
Elements: Emerald Tabletr Prima Materia. around 1 7OO, held that il the phlogiston could
be captured back into the ca1x, it r,vould restore
the original body, together u,ith its 'soul'. Stahl
'h1t"::'1:l" ll !!o | '1i)
-
and his predecessor lohann Becher had tried to
A biographer and proponent ol earl1, alchemical adapt the alchemical theory about
writings. His Llfe oJApollonius oJTltcna philosophical Sulphur to grolving chemical
emphasizes the mystic orientation of magi and knowledge in the seventeenth century. Becher
philosophers. Philostratus defends Apollonius, had dir,ided solids into three kinds of earth,
the u,andering Pythagorean mystic, against the one ofrvhich he classilied'terra pinguis', latty

128
 ffic
Physika er llysrika

earth. This was like Paracelsus's Sulphur, the

principle of alchemical inflammability.

r|3en1x

The archetypal alchemical bird, rising from its

ashes. that demonstrates the alchemical lung s
process of death and rebirth. lamily 61s51

Jung describes his lamily crest as originally

displal,ing a phoenix, representing ,]ung',
'young'. However, Jung's grandfather, a Grand
A,{asterol a Swiss Masonic Lodge, changed the
arms to reflect masonic symbols: first quarrer,
a blue cross; second and third, a gold star; last
quarter, a bunch olgrapes. Jung himseli
interpreted these symbols rather elaboratellr as pillars: philosophy, astrology, alchemy and
alchemical and Rosicrucian. ethics.' This ceaseless searcher lor cures r,r,ent
on: 'The Physician must give heed to the region
in rvhich the patient lives, its earth and its
'llli:::'v stones.' He must also heed u,hat is happening
A smal1 leather box containing Jervish texrs on in the hearrens, lor the signs ol the zodiac could
vellum, \vorn at morning prayer. Horvever, the be used for cures. 'When a medicine is fbund in
orlgin ol the word (Greek lor 'amulet') suggesrs accordance with the star, r,vhen hot is applied
a less orthodox use. Phylacteries ma1, rvell have against hot, and cold against cold, all this
been carried by Alexandrian Jews to house accords r,vith the arcanum.' See also Arcana;
Kabbalistic and magical Words of power. |ohn Planets; Poison; Zodiac.
Spencer, the seventeenth-century Hebraist,
compiled a lascinating u,ork on Jervish lan,s ,h!r:!"
and rituals, including a section on phylacteries, fll4J/s::ka
in which he implies pagan nature-magiceources, A rvork in seven parts, ascribed to the Greek
philosopher Democritus (c. 460 - c. 37Onc) and
relerred to by the alchemist Cosimus as 72e
'hI:1' Prescriptions or Reclpes . Tr,l o sections have 13
Medicine; as applied ro rhe medieval beliel in recipes betrveen them for making go1d, and
the planetary influences on the human body, as another section has nine recipes for making
rvel1 as the natural constitution ol the body, asemon, a lusrrous silvery alloy, the alchemical
with its fluxes and fluids or 'humours,. It.,vas somata.
believed that an alchemical transformation took ln the Physika can be recognized one ol the
place between man and the specilic illness he main principles ol Presocraric Greek physics:
had, according to what aspects of the that there is some kind ol material sub-stratum
planets u,ere involved. Doctors in some underlying all change. The prima mctterict was
countries, notably France, could be deprived of the usual explanation, identilied rvith the lour
their licences il thev lailed to carry an almanac elements, but Democritus said that the sub-
showing the favourable da1,s, u..ordtn* ,o stratum consisted ol indivisible parricles with
astrological r,r'orkings. lor carrying our no characteristics other than size and shape. So
lreatments. coiour, taste, smell and so on are the eff,ects on
Paracelsus said, 'Medicine rests upon four our senses, not qualities inherent in the 'atoms'

129
 Phys[ognomIcs

themselves. All this anticipates plato's and Renaissance, Pico merged Neoplatonism with
Aristotle's doctrines about prime matter. See alchemical cabala. He influenced the Borgias
also Prima Materia. with his conviction that man could control his
destiny. He was the first Christian (as opposed
tlryl:s*'i..: to Jewish) student of cabala and made a huge
impression on Reuchlin who is better knor,vn
'The art of discotering r,l,hat is within and lor his alchemical/cabalistic forays. pico was a
hidden in man" said paracelsus. brilliant 'comet of a season', and flashed
Physiognomics determines character lrom facial 'across the horizon ofEurope and passed too
leatures and skull strucLure: soon', but belore his passing, he litted in his
It tells us in .,lhat relation his heart stands treatise De Auro, in which he reports having
to God and his neighbour ... That which lills rvitnessed a friend make alchemical gold and
the heart overflows in rhe mouth ... We silver more than 60 times. He adds rvryly: ,But
should keep an eye on the outu,ard charac- the cost of producing the silver tvith a metallic
teristics rvhich narure gives a man by nater exceeded the value of the produce., He
shaping him in a certain way. For Nature does not divulge what happened in the

shapes the anatomy of a pear in such a rvay experiments for gold.

that the pear det elops into a pear rree; and
she creates a medlar's anatomy in such a uieTye\ctlc
way that it develops into a medlar bush; and
the same is true of silver and gold. Nature The positive/negative effect of electric charges
also lorges man, now a gold man, notv a resulting from crystals being subjected ro is
silver man, norv a figman, norv a bean man. pressure; the translorming power of such
crystals. See also Pyramids.
I
:*

'1'1:1i*
A lamous Latin version of a work on alchemy
'l'iid:l :1':1.1i11:: $i
:*
r"$,
,*;
A misnomer lor one of two Hermetic bundles of ,{i
and magic composed in Spain. The original texts that exercised a huge influence over
Arabic, Ghayct al-hakim (The Final Aim oi the Renaissance esoteric thought and splritual
i
Philosopher), was attributed to one of a alchemy. Ol these trvo Greek sets of texts from
brilliant group ol Spanish-Arab scholars in the antiquiry, the Esclepius had survived in Latin
caliphate olAl-Hakam II (renth cenrury), translation, but the Poimandres had been lost
Maslama ibn Ahmad. A Spanish rranslation and not lound until Cosimo de Medici, the
lvas ordered by Alfonso the Sage, King of leverously intense patron of learning in
Castille in 1256. The ptcatrix became fifteenth-century Italy, acquired a copy of the
enormously popular in Renaissance magical material from Macedonia and rhretv it ar
circles, lor it reflected, translation though it Marcilio Ficino, his mosr insplring philosopher,
rvas, the talismanic alchemical lore that to translate - forcing him to abandon even the
Maslama had encountered in his training in rhe Plato that he was in the throes ol translating.
Middle East with the secret brorherhood, the This r,vas in 1463, Ficino hurtled through the
Brethren ol Purity. See also Maslama ibn precious texrs, thought to be the actual
Ahmad: Ghayar al-hakim. utterances of Hermes, hence far pre-dating
Plato, and managed to translate all the 14

fl': *lli rirayao\ y11?! known tracts in the nick oltime, belore Cosimo
?,) died the lollorving year, 1464. Ficino labelled
One of the greatesr ligures ol the Italian these rerrered sources ol revealed wisdom the

lJU
 Planets

Pimander (The Shepherd of Men). Stretches from the birth of Christ to ,u2OOO and
The Pimander is a dream-allegory ol lorms part of the Great Year, rvhich is 24,000-
creation, similar to Genesis or the beginning ol 25,000 of our ordinary years. Alchemically, the
St lohn's Gospel. pimander, the Good Piscean Age governs distillation; purilication
Shepherd, appears to Hermes (alias Thoth, the through water, alcohol, derv. Its priests are
E$rptian god ol Sacred Letters/Logos/Word ol Chrlstian monks, Rosicrucians. cabalists. In the
Creation) and introduces himself as the Nous, preceding Arian Age of ram-worship (as in
Supreme Knowledge, and asks Hermes tvhat he Luxor, Egypr), initiation had been associared
most \vants to knor,v. Hermes, dazed b1u this with Priests of Fire, and alchemy r,l lth hor
overrvhelming rrision, asks to know himself, metal ores, sulphur and calcination.
and god. Through the 14 books thencefonvard,
Pimander proceeds to show horv Hermes can
transcend rhe worlds ol duality, and merge
rvith God.
'lii:::
Traditionally seven in number, the planets not
only corresponded to the seven days of the
Piscean Age ureek, but also to the seven metals, to the seven
major organs of the human body, to the seven
major glands or chakram and to the seven
main alchemical stages ol the Great \iVork.
'Just as the sun shines through a glass as Alchemistic diagram of
- trlercury as one ol the
though divesred ol body and substance - so the
planets that is rhe
stars penetrate one another in the body ... For source of
the sun and the moon and all planets, as rvell transmutation.

Bishop fish. the

epitome of
Christian piet1,.
Yet er,ren here are
hints ol rhe
lechen, that could
not be quenched
lu,ith hol)'rvater.
Plato

li
li
|,
as al1 the stars and the r'vhole chaos, are in t:"??--": tii

man.' So said the visionary Paracelsus. To the

lli"I ih: :lu?: ,]],

Born on Lake Como, a Latin historian ol

alchemist, there rvas no area ol lile in which
the planets were not involved. These 'babblers' extraordinary industry. Apart from his 21
ol the sky, rvayr,l'ard 'vagabonds' - as the early books on the German rvars and 31 books on
Greeks sar,r, them - were beings in their orvn recent Roman history, his greatest rvork is the
right, and participated at every level ol the Natttrdlis Htstorir in 37 books - an amazing
workings of man and nature. See also Galenl mixture ol lact and fantasy about the unit'erse,
Physicr Tattrvic Tldes. the elements, magic, medicaments, physiolog,'
ol man, minerologr, alchemical use of minerals
in medlcine and the deity and 'spirit of the
Pt?to (4??-3::B:).
Universe'.
One ol the greatesl philosophers ol a1l time. in his rvork , Piiny claims that magic ,*
x;
.*,

Plato lir,ed in Athens, and lounded his Acad- developed lrom medicine. ln Rome magical
emy there. He is thought to harre visited the practices were common in the cure of sickness' $ ..

esoteric schools ol the Pythagoreans in Eg'pt Some animals have particular magic power: the
and studied esoterlc arts. He did not think as dragon, the serpent, the basilisk, all ol rvhich
highly ol the written rvord as the spoken, so his are alchemical symbols. Pliny discusses the $
writings, mostly in dialogue form, reflect the apotropaic powers ol plants to avert evi1, like
$
oral tradition of his lectures and rvere never the mistletoe, and the alchemical properties ol
$
intended to be revered. He was a major precious stones and minerals. He notes the ;.

influence on Christianity via St Augustine and parts ol the human body that can be used in
&
the Neoplatonists, thence the Arabian alchemy - salir,a and the humours, black and
$
alchemists and Latin thinkers of the early ye1lor,v bile, phlegm and b1ood. Sickness can be
magically translerred from men to animals, he t
Middle Ages (like Alain de Lille and Adelard ol :.

Bath), belore Aristotle seized the European by means ol amulets.

sa1,'s, *
A11 these beliels and practices reflect the
imagination in the thirteenth century.
In the generations succeeding P1ato, it was decadence of the Roman Empire, rvhere people
$
not his Laws or Republic that gripped the mind, desperatell' clutch at straws and their reason
but his Tlmaetts and Phaedrus, conveying gir,es lvay to Egvptlan magic, alchemy and fi
Plato's theory of ldeas that exist in the eternal astrologr. The iact that the Emperor Diocletian
rvorld beyond the visible. Moreover, T[maeus burned the books ol Egzptian alchemists
shows a remarkably modern understanding ol means that they must have been a considerable
physical probability in this rvorld, compared threat to his authority. Underground
r,vith eternal certainty in the r,vorld ol sacred alchemical writings like the Corpus Hermet[cum
principles. Whole schools of commentators and books on magic r'vere avidly studied by
grew up around Plato's PhilosoPhY, magicians and soothsayers. Pliny's vier'v is lhat
Christianizing it or adding structure to it like alchemy stems directly lrom astrological
scaffolding, so the original became obscured' theory, wherebl' planets and their larvs rule the
and Neoplatonism developed. By the Middle universe. Life is but a reflection ol astral phen-
Ages, Plato had been sieved through the omena. Correlations exist between planets and
Nestorians and the Arabians, and the Jervish metals (Sun and gold; Mars and ironl Saturn
thinkers, and got mixed up rvith magic and and leadr Moon and silver) and every star has
fancy; so the medieval alchemists got him its orvn colour. The creative porver ol gold is
'aureus
rather second-hand. This did not deter them, due to the spots on the sun, just as the
sol' lthe sun's yellorv-red colour) corresponds
hon ever, from seeking the Piatonic r'vor1d ol
to the colour of go1d. xilars, r'vhich Pliny calls
the Eternal, beYond change.

172
 From a design for
Pliny' s Na tLtra I Hi s ro(y
(Venice,1472).

'igneus', recalls the colour ol biood and iron

Pn:um1
and signlfies \var, while Venus's bluish tint
reflects the colour of copper salts, cuprum, from The spirit or Breath of God (in Greek and Coptic
the Isle ol Cyprus (sacred to Venus). magical texts).

_'Pliy l: y,?l ,,?)

_':f:-i
The greatest Neoplatonic interpreter ol plato's 'Medicines are our poisons and poisons our
vision of the True, the Beaurilul and the Good. medicines. Even the New Testament can be
His works rvere edited by his pupil porphyry poison.' Thus spake paracelsus, precursor of
and absorbed by lelvish and Arabian alchemist- homeopaths. 'He lvho despises poison does not
physicians such as Isaac of Kairouan and know what is hidden in it,' he observes. ,ln all
Avicenna in the ninth and tenth centuries. things there is a poison, and there is nothing
.'71 Plotinus was a mystic; his works are, rvithout a poison. It depends only upon the
horvever, extremely intellectual. He constructs dose whether a poison is a poison or not.,
at a 'cleaned up' plato - a logical system ol the The study oi toxicologz and antitoxics was
universe, rvorking up from matter to soul, lrom rhe subject of many Arabian pharmacologists
soul to reason, and from reason to God. the and alchemists. Ibn Wahshi),ya wrote a Book oJ
flnal abstraction beyond matter, pure existence. Poisons in the tenth century and pretended it
On the human level, plotinus sarv a Trinity: had come through from the ancient
man has a spirit, a soul and a body. On the Babylonians. The danger was that an alchemist
cosmic level, everything can move up or down could get a bad name if he r,vere suspected of
the ladder ol being, alchemically raising or using poisons for criminal ends. Erren the
lowering vibrations through varying degrees ol Plcqtrix had some quite explicit poison-recipes.
fineness or grossness. See also Chakra; Tatnvic See also Ghayat al-hakim; Ibn Wahshiyya;
Tides. Picatrix.
'r!r.- -'' Po[tgraphlce

. ,,) ,!
-'i..
\:a,
\ '.

-:
tollg:!hi:_'- purilication through the mind: the lile ol inner
self-sufficiency that allorvs complete altruism'
A popular seventeenth-century work by
!V.Salmon, which analyses alchemy in the light
ol the new discoveries about the quantifiable ':::-'_:I
nature ol substances (for instance, mercury had The porver and elficacy ol the transmuting
been lound to have a density 13'l, times that ol agent (the Stone or the Tincture, used in the
water, and air had been lound to have a linite remedy) in Paracelsus's lorm of alchemical
r,veight). The Polygraphr'ce states factually that medicine. The Tincture rvould be extracted lrom
'Alchymie is an Arabick word, and signilies the a plant, and through a series of Operations
Transmutation ol Metals Semi-Metals, and involving dilution, lts mass was reduced ll'hile
Minerals'. The semi-metals are defined as at the same time the energy was increased, to
antimony, cinnabar, tin-g1ass and zinc. the point rvhere in the end there ',vas no
physical matter leflt. What the alchemist-healer

'3ry l:h"
*l !ii19119 illl-1*l
rvas r,vorking rvith was non-chemically-
classiliable 'potency'. See also Homeopathy'
The rvisp-like Ar,ignon Pope (born Iacques
Duese), who left behind him a legend, a Bull
and an apocryphal book. The legend was that ':'1:1:lp'i::Ti
he amassed a lortune of 25 million irancs, The alchemically produced porvder (that is' one
minted alchemically. The Bu11 rvas his lorm ol the Stone) that is cast ('projected') into
Spondent Parlter ol L317 , rvhich lorbade the a crucible containing a metal, in order to eflect
science ol alchemy, condemned alchemists to its transmutation.
exile and imposed heary fines on any one of the theories about metais \'vas that,
defrauders r,vho lvere proliteering by like everything else in this rvorld of sin, they
transmutatlon. The apocryphal book on the rvere continually striving to better themselves
transmutation of metals, L'Elixlr des lrom base metals into more relined ones and
that alchemy could hasten the process' See also
Philosophes, ou I'Art Transmutrttoire des
Mdt(tux, was attributed to this pope, albeit 200 Valenline.
years late.
P:im?m.ate::?
PoTh.yry (C. 234 -- 3Ll
l. .
Prime matter, chaos or unpurified material,
The lJeoplatonist pupil and editor of Plotinus belore the start ol the alchemlcal Operation'
and master ol lamblichus. Porphyry, a Most ol the alchemical theories about prime
Phoenician born in Tyre, moved to Rome to matter stem one \'vay or another from the pre-
study under Plotinus. He not only'codified and Socratic Greek ideas about creation. Thales,
edited Piotinus's works into six books of nine Anaximander and Anaximenes, the old
chapters each thence their tit1e, Ennends) but Colonials from Asia Minor, drelv their
he rvrote his or,vn interpretation ol the Platonic conclusions on created matter and the elements
Soul, and the one beyond Existence. His On the lrom their eye-rvitness knor'vledge ol floods and
Pythagorean Llfe. his commentaries on swamps, storms and mists that men had to
Aristotle's Physics and his lracts on struggle rvith in Babl'lonia and Egrpt'
Harmonics. On Numbers, On Oracles, On Alchemists themselves are deliberately
Incorporeals still sun'ive. What appealed to obscure in their delinitions ol prima materlq''
later philosophers and spiritual alchemists rvas They give clues for onll'the most dedicated
the way Porphyry advocated the path oi pilgrims of the Great Work. Although no two

134
 Phsychopomp

:ar accounts are identical, it can be deduced that

:. alchemists often used ordinary go1d, ordinary '::f i:
silver and ordinary mercury because these In the temple at Pselcis, a
metallic minerals were among the most hieroglyph, c. 2508c, depicts
promising to work on vis-d-vis their generative, Hermes Trismegistus holding an
and translormative properties. Gold rvould be ankh in one hand and, in the
purified by antimony, silver by cupellation and other, a staflwith a serpent, a
mercurial salts b,v distillation. Then they rvould scorpion. a har,rrk's head and an
all be ready lor the next stage ol the Operation asp enclosing a circle.
in the Hermetic vase or egg.
.re c 1o7B)
":"ll'!1gT
A Neoplatonist of the eleventh-
century Byzantine Empire and a
Ieading authority on magic and r'
alchemy. His gloss on the Hermetic
text Poimandres confirms that a1l
!r
the Greek concepts of God came
from the East. Psells justilies the I t7-) 1 '

superiority oi the East over Greek

philosophy by conlirming that lr
I l, .
I
/

Poryphry had gone to an Eg,ptian

priest, Anebon, to be initiated into
t
\l,B-
t---*:r
a1(
t--9
,\

'

the First Cause.

Hierogll'ph of Hermes
Psells's writings sun ived the turbulence ol
Trismegistus c. 250BC.
the Byzantine Empire's last 400 years and rvere
rediscovered by Italian scholars in the lifteenth
i->Lr century. It may well have been that Psells's
commentary on the Poimandres was known to
Cosimo de A,ledici and Ficino and helped the
latter in his task of translation.

Prima materia. The Earth is nurse ofthe Stone. Themes

in Maier, Mvlius and Srolcius. '::od:llsl7?h:u
The whole body ol writings that are ascribed
P:"-']i, to, as opposed to rea11y written by, an author.
\i ::? ::') The annals of alchemy are strewn with such
A late Neoplaronist who commented on plato's rvorks. Even genuine authors sometimes
Tlmaeus and on Euclid's Geometty. Proclus pretended they hadn't written this or that
::1IS dwells more than earlier Platonists on the work, secrecv and lear ol persecution being the
and magical. The world ol the soul is surrounded by most likely reasons.
angels, daemons and music. Proclus's
mathematical lrrorld is a Pythagorean world ol Pry.horytnl
Sacred Geometry and cosmic proportion. It was
these ideas that influenced Renaissance Hermes was the original psychopomp, the
thinkers and occultists such as John Dee. See conductor ol the souls of the dead to Hades. In
also Dee; Plato; $rthagoras; Timaeus. alchemical allegory, it is the spiritual guide,

135
 . _F.-
=9#
J-g';r* Ptah
Y,,W
.':1.. .,r | 1.. - ,

r,vhousually appears to the seeker in a dream, reportedly shipu,recked in 1313, is said to have
and leads him on his journey as Beatrice put strange drugs into a pumpkin in the hope
Ieads Dante, Polia leads Poliphilus, and Thalia ol creating a homunculus. Cinderella's lairy
leads Thomas Vaughan inhts Lumen de godmother realiy eflf'ected an alchemical
[,umine- translormation with her pumpkin; and in Tula,
the Toltec city of alchemical craftsmen,
The psychopomp. everything rvas larger than lile, including 'ears
Beatrice leads Dante
ol corn and pumpkins that reached the size ol
through the spheres of
the moon and the
man'. See also Homunculus; Villanova.
planets to the
lirmament oi the lixed rqamial
stars and the empl,rean.

fust as the name 'Egypt' was 'Alkemi,' the

'b1ack earth' of alchemy, so the pyramids rvere
the physical representation ol that 'black
earth', whether the sand-dunes or the pyramid-
shaped rock-formations at Abu Simbel. The
alchemical signs for the lour elements are all
pyramids, l,.iEi-, ,,vhich become dynamic in
Ptah the actual man-built pyramids ol Egypt (i.e.
rhey fle not remain smtic like a triangle). The
According to Zosimos this god rvas revered as dynamic force ol pyramids I'vas used lor
patron ol alchemists and had furnaces in his priestly lnitiation and translormation of states
temple at Memphis. In Egyptian religion, Ptah ol being in early Egyptian cults. In later times,
was the cosmic architect. His job rvas to gir,e fvthagoras and Piato codified and described
lorm to the rvords ol Ra (God the Creator) as the special powers of pyramids in terms of
spoken by Thoth (Hermes). He olten stands on mathematics Platonic solids and
a plinth in the form ol the glyph lor X,Ia-at, cosmologies. The tetrahedron, the iirst ol the
cosmic law, divine harmon_v. See also Platonic solids, is a pyramid. These solids rvere
Horapollo; Thoth. archetl,pal princlples behind the created rvorld.
In alchemical literature the ideas of
Puffers B,'thagoras and Plato came through the
Neoplatonists to Renaissance lta1y. Not only
Amateur alchemists and quacks, so called are books on architecture and human anatomy
because ol their lrantic use ol the bel1orvs. For based on 'the golden proportion', but so are
the main first stage ol the alchemical books on astronomy and occult magic. Stars
Operation, calcination, all kinds ol lurnaces and pyramids appear on cabalistic diagrams.
_ were used, and all kinds ol'magical' luels - oil, The symbol of the Zohar ('brightness',
wax, pitch, peat, hair, bones, even camel-dung. 'splendour') is a pyramid and its shadow. The
The ever-hopeful puiler thought that the more Seven Wonders ol the World r,l'ere regarded as
he u,orked at the bellows, the greater the heat sublime commentaries on the pyramids, with
r'l,ou1d be and the quicker the transmutation. their square bases grounded in 'Nature', their
sides soaring up to metaphysical Unity. The
tomb of X,lausolus at Halicarnassus was a
1*tIil pyramid rvith a circular precinct; on the top oi
A puff'er The alchemical egg. womb or incubator. The the pyramid was carved a chariot u,ith lour
shadouy Catalan alchemist, Arnold Villanova, horses. harnessed to a lorm of cross.

136
 flithdgoras

All these Wonders f,rom antiquity were the square) and its diagonal and his
mixed up in medieval thought with magic and formulations on the square roots of 2, olJ and
Christianity and alchemy. The pyramid turns
ol 5, which led in larer ages to the building ol
up as rhe Golden Tripod upon r,vhich stands
the transformational Gothic cathedrals.
the Hermetic vase that incubates the precious
What seized the medieval alchemlcal mind
Stone in the Great Work.
most was, on the one hand, the contemplative
Finally, rhe mosr dazzling,Es/prian, book lifestyle of the pythagorean school, with its
in the late alchemical tradition is the Oedipus
overtones of Egrptian secret rituals and, on the
Aegtptiacus of Athanasius Kircher, with its
other, the Sacred Geometry that included the
commentaries on pythagorean and Orphic
live Platonic Solids from which God created the
mysteries, hieroglyphics, harmonics and
volume of forms in the universe. These five are:
pyramids, and pyramid-shadows as vibrations
the tetrahedron, the octahedron, the cube, the Pythagoras, after a
of sound or light. He even compares the decoration on the title
icosahedron and the dodecahedron. All ol these
Mexican pyramids r,r,ith the Eg,ptian ones, as page of Orontius's Ite
shapes crop up again and again in alchemical
proof ol a sacred'sun-tvorship' connection. Astrolabe euadrant
emblems and in sacred architecture. (Paris,153,1).
Kircher's mind ,,vas like his real museum, a
mausoleum entombing monumental relics.

uu-n.7!1.chni,c.art

Translormarion by lire or by alchemy.

.g_ilil
'v-lh?s:o,?? !i lig - f
A mystical philosopher, mathematician and
founder of an esoteric school; more of a
concept than a person, so misty are his origins.
On the \tthdgorean Llfe by porphyry, the
Neoplatonist, sums up best the man1, tales that
grer'tr around ry/thagoras: he believed
that the
soul rvas immortal and that it came back many
times into bodies of plants and animals; that
life r,vas cyclical; that God rvas supreme music;
that His \Vord was Number manifest as Form;
that the experience of lile in a finite, limited
bod1, u,as rhe purpose ol discovering
supernatural existence rvithin the linite.
Pythagoras saw the relationship betlveen
number and cosmic realities _ especially in the
simple paradox rhat a half produces a double:
a cell divides into two. Hence his parricular
obsession with the square, its root (or side of
 The rvay this 'Ars Combinandi' worked can be
only crudely illustrated in English. Because
Hebrew is a consonantal language, built up in
root-groups of three, there are seemingly end-
less ways oi combining the consonants to rep-
resent God's infinity. Thus, the three root-con-
9ibilil sonants of Qabalah, Q-B-L, transliterated into
Or Kabbalah, the specific lorm oflervish English, might give us:
mysticism that grew up in Languedoc, southern
France, in the twellth century, as opposed to QBL: cabal, cable, quibble, Kabul, Keeble, key
blolv, cub il1, coy bu11, cow bellow, corv
the Christianized cabala. Qabalah in this
be1ow, queue below, cobble;
spelling relates directly to the magical root
letters Q-B-L, the 'received tradition' ol Israel, QLB: Caleb, calibre, club, clob(ber), all by, key
alibi; *
rerrealed by God to select saints and prophets in
Babylonia.
BLQ: ball-queue, be low-key, bel1 key, black,
baulk, bu1k, b1ock, bullock, be alike, be
Indirectly, Qabalah or Kabbalah links with
like;
the word 'Qiblah' in Aramaic meaning 'amulet'.
According to A.E. waite, the third of the four BQL: buckle, buck low, be cool, buy coa1,
bow-keel, back all, obey a call;
main branches of Kabbalah is Theurgr and the
talismanic use ol Divine Names. It was thought LQB: Lockerbie, Loch Kerby, look by,
likeab(1e),1ow kerb;
that rvords held power, particularly the 'Word
ol God'. the Logos. Letters were potencies. LBQ: Iie back, lorv back, law book, le blke,
el bok, 1ow-ebb quay.
energies, entities lvith a lile oltheir own. In
Qabalah, the 22 Hebrew letters were used in
{
By invoking these words magically, their {
invocations to angelic beings and meditations. signilicance would be collectively porverful.
This sort ol divine perlormance with letters lrras While all this Qabalistic balancing with
turned into an Art, 'Ars Combinandi', and dates anagrams was not synonymous with alchemy,
back to the Sepher Yetzirah (the Book of it nevertheless conjoined vast rambling edilices
Creation) and Geonic Jelvry. ol alchemical-cabalistic literature that rvere
The ability to create entities that would created, Gormenghast-like, from sephirotic
materialize through the invocation of certain trees, magical symbols and Enochian
magical combinations ol letters seized alphabets, by the Groaning Tituses: Lu1l,
alchemical magi with Faustian visions ('solemn Cornelius Agrippa and Dee. See also Cabala;
lollies', Waite called them). Aziel of Gerona, the Geonic; Kabbalah; Theurgy.
thirteenth-century Kabbalist, describes the
language mysticism olthe 'Gabalah' as having
live processes, which lead to Gnosis or q^:^*,!:
perception of God: ?l
Two compilers, with the same name, of
1 Tiqqun: the letters are placed in harmonyl alchemico-scientific compendia of the Islamic
2 Ma'amar: the letters are assembled into sciences. The first a1-Qazwini, Zakariyya (d.
wordsr 1285) worked in the fields of botany, zoolog,
3 Seruf: the letters are permutated; and Minerologz, with an extraordinary mix of
4 Mikhlal: the letters are collected together in fable (as in a bestiary) angelologr and
all their combinations; demonologr, which fitted in alongside his
Heshbon: the letters are calculated according scientiiic analysis olworld structure. It was the
to their numerical value. last section of his work, Minerologr, that
 Quadruplex

prompted alchemical exegesis, as lor instance

Alfonso X' s Lapidario , and The Book oJ Stones,
Magical Use oJ,
The second a1-Qazwini, Hamd Allah
Mustar,rrfi (fourteenth century) expanded on the
first al-Qazwini, u/riting in persian and
becoming a source of inspiration lor Latin
clerics in the Middle Ages, including \rincent of
Beauvais. See also Quadruplex.

9lir1h
The discarded 'shells' ol the rvorld in the
making caused by sin, Eve's fault. In Kabbalah,
it was the evil and adverse spheres or worlds
Barnacle geese, r,r,hich
that are composed of the filth, rvhich rvas
expelled from the Tree of Lile when it emanated
aT:l lvere supposed to grou,
on trees, were
from the unmanifest at the creation. Two-a-penny among alchemists - a charlatan incorporated into the
The law of Hermes Trismegistus stated the doctor rvho ollered rvonderful remedies. See cosmologr of Zakarigra
greater the lront the greater the back. So in al-Qazrvini.
also Puffers.
alchemy, the qlipoth rvere the dark sides ol
alchemy, in which compilers of grimoires,
pseudo-alchemists, witch-hunters and some
popes dabbled.

An itinerant quack,

!u1druylex
'Fourlold' or'divided into lour', as in Vincent
ol Beauvais's Speculum euadruplex (The
Fourlold Mirror- i.e. the cosmos, which reflects
the microcosm in the macrocosm). The lour
directions, north, south, east and west, rvork
vertically as rvell as horizontally.

death

A qlipoth demon, typical oi the dark side olalchemv

illustrated in grimoires.
 - _#,;*
-^=l-Jh Quantum healing

'- 't.Y'
They symbolize alchemicalll,: rhar cannot be broken down into anything
Transformation: vertically lrom lead to gold, smaller, in which \,vaves may be emitted or
from below to above; and horizontally lrom absorbed. It works u,ith ultra high speed
east to west, from death, setting sun, to accelerators.
birth, resurrection and sunrise. Curiously, modern physics is hi_tech,
2 Gold: that which is transformed. whereas modern medicine is not. Quantum
3 Man: from the static Christ-on-the-sacrificial physics, as opposed ro the old mechanistic
cross + , to the dynamic resurrected man, physics, is widely accepted as the 'uncertainty'
humanist, zodiacal x. theory ol intrinsic spontaneity at microscopic
As Paracelsus says in his paragranum: level. Nature is essentially chaotic, so
inherently unpredictable.
Just as in heaven there is a Saturn of fiery Modern medicine has not taken such a leap.
nature so on Earth there is one of earthly The only hi-tech apparatus here is human
nature, and just as there is a Sun in the consciousness: the inner alchemv.
water, so is there one in heaven. In man
each thing is fourfold, rvhat lies in the
auar111E3v1y
remotest corner of the earth. casts its
shadow on man and man is sulfused rvith A lever recurring every third day (by inclusive
what lies in the depth of the sea ... \,Vhat is reckoning, fourth). Mentioned by the alchemist
the difference between the Sun, Moon, Basil Valentine, for r,vhich fever the monkly
Mercury, Saturn and Jupiter in heaven, and herbalist had alchemical remedies, potions
the same planets in man? The dillerence is carelully prepared according to the positions ol
only one ol florm. That is why there are not the planets and administered to patients in
four arcana but only one arcanum; however, conjunction with blood-letting, ar rimes
it has four aspecrs, just as a tolver has lour astrologically determined. Ficino conlesses to
sides, according ro the lour rvinds. have sulfered from this fever.
So man participates in the lour elements in dif-
lering proportions. paracelsus believed that E::':u',?\t'?v
rvater and earth formed the elemental body of
man, and fire and air the 'starry' bodv. See also The site of mystical cults in prehistoric north
Elements. India. There is evidence in Harappan seal-
writing and marks on pots that these ancient
potters used the transformational powers in
gliil* h"illlg mandalas and sacred geometry.

A term coined by Deepak Chopra, in his book ol

the same name, to describe the jump to a new eu;-yz7!co7tt
level of consciousness that prevents illness
Derived from 'quetzal' : lantastically plumed
continuing. It has much in common with laith
bird and'coatl' = serpent. The feathered
healing and spontaneous remissions; a mind-
serpent, a culture-hero of the Toltecs, whose
over-body transformational process, an
mother undenvent an alchemical conception
alchemical leap, whereby a person is cured of
when she swallorved a piece of jade years after
the incurable.
her husband's death. One of euetzalcoarl's
names is Priest of the Stone; his symbols are
ay'l:,"lnr:l:: two stones, painted serpents on temple laEades
as caryatids ('coatl', a snake resembling a
ln physics, rhe quanrum is a building-block caduceus).

140
 Qu[nta €ssentia

9:i':l1i
Derived lrom 'quinque' : 5 and ,uncia' : a
twelith: five-twelfths. A quincunx is an
arrangement of live ligures within a square or
rectangle, thus:

Io--ol One ar each corner and rhe fihh in

I o olI rhe cenrre. as on a die or in a pack

Io ol cards.

Historically, it has inlused the worlds ol

nature, man and the stars, although its
significance is no longer noted. Alchemically,
its 'whole' is more than the sum of its parts.
In Elizabethan times, the quincunx was part
ol the rraditional layout of a garden, with live
trees on a latvn, or at the corners and cenlre of
a maze. Those great masonic exponents of
gardens and their cosmic relationships, Francis

Quetzalcoad doing penance by drau,ing his or,vn blood

Bacon and Sir Thomas Browne, mused on the
- quincuncial shapes of reticulate plants, in the
a priestly actl\,it),. Embiems associated r,vith
Quetzalcoatl
are the conical hat. the f'eather device on his back, rhe Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
curved stick and the conch sheli at his foot.
in the mineral world, the qulncunx occurs
in the formation of metals, in occult atomic
structures, while architecture is lounded on
9ll:k:il'". 'five' says Bror,vne, naming Vitruyius and
Associated with philosophic Salt in the firsr Alberti. Cathedrals, churches, pyramids,
stages ol the alchemical Operation, quicksilver mausolea, labyrinths and mandalas, all the
was known to the ancient Greeks as ,liquid great sacred spaces, take on the cosmic
silver' or 'silver water, and to pliny as signilicance ol the Hyades, the ,quincunx of
'hydrargrrum', the origin of its chemical
heaven'.
symbol Hg. Often confused with its counterpart Man can cross lrom 4 to 5: from his nature
Philosophic Mercury, common quicksilver is the containing the four levels ol physical matter _
Flying Sla,,,e, and as such this ignis;fatuus has stone, plant, animal, man - to transcended
led many a quacksalver into the mire. man, God-in-man.
This transforming from a thing,s four-ness
ail-bl llli:1: :,.khYll li lg?_g!l
to its five-ness is cabalistic alchemy. There nras
a magical signiflcance in the ratio 5:12 _ firze
The teacher ol Mary Baker Eddy, the American was the number of regeneration and, in the
lounder of the Christian Scientists, Quimby rvas zodiac, Venus, the silver planet, was in the
a clock,maker by trade. He believed that constellation of the Hyades, the iive, the
everyone possesses healing powers, as they do quincunx.
dowsing powers. He demonstrated remedies
that worked even though they were prepos_
terous. He rvas convinced that the power of the 9:11ii !:::-'11"
mind could project onto the diseased organ, The qulntessence, lifth element or
working a type ol alchemical translormation. Philosopher's Stone. Several alchemists have
Qulntal

L
:f

r{ll

Alcheml'. atter a lvoodcut

I
Iii
t,
in Thurneysser's Pzzrnra i:
ll.
Ess€nti(r (Leipzig, 1574).
jj,
i
h

written books of this title, including a'i"1::':i::

Thurnevsser, Rupiscissa and Cornelius Drebbel.
The lilth essence or element, born ol the other
lour - earth, water, fire, air - leading man
higher up the gamut ol'vibrations'. Hamlet
9:i":"1 knerv it: 'What is this quintessence of dust?' So
A unit of weight equalling 100 kilogrammes. did Paracelsus: 'The quinta essentia can
The notorious Pope .fohn XXII, in his book,{rs cleanse a man's lile ... Therefore each disease
Trctnsmutatoria, boasted ol,,vorking on the requires its own quinta essentia.'
Philosopher's Stone and ol creating 200 bars of Cornelius Agrippa saw the quintessence as
alchemical go1d, each welghing one quintal. the 'medium u,hereby Celestiall Souls are
Astoundingly, alter his death, 25 million gold joyned to gross bodies' and that bestorvs upon
florins were lound ln the papal treasury. This them'wonderfull gilts'.
lvas quite unaccountable. for ecclesiastical In terms of the Platonic solids of
conflicts bet,,veen Avigncn and the Vatican Pythagoras, quintessence rvas associated with
whittied arvay papal fortunes. the dodecahedron.

142
 Iil3l11i l: ln?o l?l?) Fanfagrurl.
A renegade Benedictine friar and the author of
Pantagruel, who, like his Swiss contemporary,
Paracelsus, 'thwacks at quacks,. This roaring Zes bomblee e t efpo uttas
bufloon, Hellenist, scholar, lapsed curate, 6tes falct5 ( Woueffcs Du riefrcn0me'
physician, alchemist and picaresque inventor pantaguet l{op Des Dipfo6esf
of Gargantua, is master of the ,perhaps, rather [rf] 0u gronO gedrgcrgdn,
than the 'certainly so,, of the ,probable, ol the tuat frlpofeS nouuefte,
Timaeus, the 'approximation, oi the rneup$ maifrEe.
Upanishads, the quantum leap olmodern .6fcofrl6cs
physics, the inspired jump. Wirh gusto, he fo[icr.
mingles dross rvith triple-refined gold. He
rvrites in puns, the goetic language beloved of
alchemists.This'langue godtique', alchemical
argor, is largely lost in the English translation
by Urquhart, brilliant though that is.
Rabelais' masonic manner is known as
blazoning. Even the name ,Gargantua',
blazoned abroad, is in alchemical code: Gar A$1 be Ben6 o llgory q ta moi/ron
(stone), gant (great), Tua (one of the Tua tribe) 6eEtoube nourr?/0rrr te Dince
- i.e. Son of the Giant Stone. The spirit of Pleo noflre Dcrnele Clonfog,
Gargantua is caught in the modern Astenx
books, where Obelix is a latter-day Gargantua,
a mover ol menhirs, ol giant stones.
Behind this guise, Rabelais' humorous il
savage pen scratches and digs at Doctors of
Learning at the Sorbonne, or lvherever
pedants lurk - 'striking athwart and alongst',
like his character Friar John of the Frails. Real
o"dl:1ls3ld Title-page from
Rabelats' Pantagruel
knorvledge is hidden. The ,vie horrifique' ol
Aurum radex. lust as ,aurum potabile' was the (1532). Rabelais'name
Garganrua hides its paradoxical opposite, the gold potion, the liquid gold elixir, so radical is written as the
'vie aurilique', the lile olgold_making. anagram Alcofry-bas
gold, root-gold, was gold in its raw srare,
Rabelais was apparently inspired by a very Nasier.
mined gold, the llrst stage before the
different writer of alchemical dreams: alchemical Operation.
Francesco Colonna, who narrated the Dream of
Potiphtlus.ln turn, Rabelais had lonathan Slvift
under the spell ol his magical nonsense, his
'calembours lanternois,. Fittingly, alchemically,
1i-::lli
A fanciful kenning for vellum. The Ram was
Rabelais disappears suddenly and lor ever in the Golden Ram of Greek myth; his skin, the
1553. Hidden in his dunghill of a work is the Golden Fleece which, by devious journeys
jewel. See also Urquhart.
through the ages, came to be associated with

143
Rat[onal soul

the 'skin' or 'parchment' upon rvhich

magical, alchemical spells were rvritten -
eYen the Lqlden Papyrus, The Suldas
Enqtclopaedia held that the Golden Fleece
of the Argonauts \\ras a papyrus holding
the secrets ol gold-making. Pernety links
the Golden Fleece lvith the sacred vellum
ol alchemical scripts, just as he links the
lirst stage ol the Magnum Opus r,vith
calcination, represented byAries the Ram.

o::i:1"1:'ll
In medieval alchemy, the 'vegetative soul'
rvas assigned to plants, the'sensitive soul'
to animals and rhe 'rational soul' to
human beings. Through 'angel magic', the
process of summoning non-physical The rar,en, sl,mbol ol alchemical death (nigredo or
melanosis).
higher beings, it u,as thought possible lor
human adepts to reach the 'angelic soul'.
This philosophy r,vas lamiliar to all smel1, and the process gradually develops, and
alchemist-thinkers lrom Aristotle onlvards, therefore the Raven's Head is ca11ed a deadly
through Isaac, Avicenna, Rhazes and St poison. The odour is rather intellectually than
Augustine, to Albertus Magnus. Even sensuously perceptible. The blackness must
Shakespeare has 'rational mind' as the precede whiteness.'
distinguishing mark between man and the And again: 'The beginning ol our rvork is
animals, 'who rvant discourse of reason'. the Black Raven rvhich like a1l things that are
It ties in rvith the theories on 'degree' and to grow and receive life must tirst putrefy.'
hierarchy, that everything in the universe has The raven \,\ras the taboo bird in all cults.
its proper place in the order of being. See also Three Raven Kings r,vere associated lvith the
lsaac of Kairouan. bird's translorming polvers ol death, decay and
terror. The first was odin the Norse God who
had nvo rar,en prophet-messengers (r,vinged
Yl:'kllg black mercuries), Huginn and Munin. The
In alchemy, the nigredo (melanosis) stage of second was King Arthur, rvho in Wales and
the Magnum Opus, personilied as the black Cornrvall u,as believed to inhabit the raven's
carrion king of decomposition and death. body, rvhile his half-sister Morgan 1e Faye was
Edward Kelley's Theatre oJ Terres trial the Raven Queen Morrigan, a death-goddess
Astronomy, Chapter the Tenth is headed: 'Of r,vho took the lorm of a raven. The third king
the Blackness of Raven's Head by means of particularly connected r'l ith the raven was Bran
which the copulation of Sun and Moon takes the Blessed, the lrish cult-hero, whose veryr
place.' name 'Bran' means 'raven'. Bran was also
In this chapter are described the stages ol connected r,vith Saturn, the 'black' planet,
putrelaction, designated by their black colour lvhich symbolized alchemical lead.
and fetid smell. Putrefaction must do its work Mythologically, Bran and Saturn rvere both
belore the body can be joined to the soul: 'For eaters ol flesh.
solution and putrelaction begin r,vith a letid According to some ancient Greek traditions,

144
 Reuchlin, /ohann

another associate of the raven was Esclepius, A11 three magi expounded on the
King of the Thessalian crow-torem tribe of wonder-working Power of the Word
Lapiths. He, like Bran, was a patron olhealing oi God, the Tetragrammaton; all
and resurrection. This is a variation of the three combined Muslim, Jervish and
caduceus theme. See also losis. Christian philosophy, and sarv rhe
'Harmony ol the World' as a
o:bl' possibility. Not satislied with the
arid scholasticism of Erasmus. the
Meaning'thing-two'. The hermaphodite, called theory ol theologz, philosophy, and
by Paracelsus the 'bisexual creature, which science, these rhree cabalisrs
transmutes silver and other metals into gold ... anticipated the practical magic of
It transforms the body, removing its harmlul Trithemius, Cornelius Agrippa and
parts, its crudity, its incompleteness., Dee. They sought to empower language, to lohann Reuchlin

energize it, so that it rose beyond being mere

Re ip ub I icae Chis tiano po li tanae words on a page. A man possessed of such
o:':::!!:: (:?:') divine glyphs acquired Faustlan knowledge
(the historical Faust was actually a
A Utopian book by the Rosicrucian, Johann contemporary ol Reuchlin), bur pico and
Valentin Andreae. Reuchlin r'vere quick to asserr that this was for
good, not evil. Their training through cabala
Conversation between
o:l:11 rvas stringent. It was a matter of combining the three characters in
letters and numbers, incantations and magical Reuchlin's De Verbo
A glass vessel consisting of a large bulb with a codes, as laid down in sacred books. l4iqfico: Baruchius the
long neck narrorving ar the end, rvhich is used The odd idea ol Word made Flesh was ol Iew, Sidonius the creek
in alchemical reactions, especially distillation. and Capnion the
course not [ew: St ]erome and many ol the
Christian rvho could
Sometlmes the vessel was used for heating Church Fathers had made it respectable. The be Reuchlin himseli.
mercury lor purilication. It was knorvn in
alchemy as the philosopher's egg, capable of
being Hermetically sealed, in lvhich various
metals for purilying could 'incubate'.
Michael Maier's Atqlantr Fugiens, Emblem
8, shorvs a rather coy knight poised r,vith
pointed toe and srvord aloft, about to strike a
huge egg balanced on a lorv table. This is
another variation on the philosopher's egg, laid
by the self-generaring phoenix. See also prima
Materia.

l:yllll l:nl l: :, | :: ?,,)

Alias 'Pythagoras reborn' Reuchlin was the
lirst great German Christian cabalist, ol the
School ol Ramon Lull and pico della Mirandola.
He was as profoundly influenced as Lull and
della Mirandola b1, the medieval Hermetlc
tradition, and the cabalistic tradition ol the
Jeu,s in Spain and ttaly.

145
Rhazes

Word on which Reuchlin et al. dwelt so at Baghdad, the centre ofAbbasid culture, and
obsessively was the Logos, the Hebrew then put his alchemy into practice as medicine.
Tetragrammaton, the holy fourJetter Word, In lbn Khallikan's Biogrcrphical Dlctionary,
inaudible, unsounded and unmanifest. By the the entry for Rhazes says: 'ln his youth he
addition of the U, shin, 'sh', the played the lute and vocal music - but later
unpronounced, uncreated became manilest in renounced these, saying that music proceeding
Christ, i"l J i''l' became ;"1 f U i'l r . The breath ol lrom between mustachios and a beard had no
God breathed into the centre of the inaudible charms to recommend it.'
name, 'shhhhhhhhhh'. Rhazes called into question all orthodox
The irony is that Reuchlin wrote his two medicine, from the sacrosanct Galen himself;
wildly influential works on this topic - De he questioned Islamic theology; and he
Verbo Mirlfico (1494) and De Arte Cabalistica pioneered metaphysics and scientilic
(15 1 7) - in Latin, even though he was fluent in rationalism, bringing alchemy into the open.
Hebrew. He had been taught in Italy first by the He used the same substances as his
famous Jewish Kabbalist Jacob Loans (d. 1506) predecessors but described them in practical
and then by Obadiah Slorno; so the magical language, logging all his experiments carefuliy.
properties in the sound of the Hebrew letters He discussed simply, without mystique, the
was 1ost, as was the marvellous punning on uses ol alchemical apparatus and lurnaces, and
meaning, to all but those familiar with the the Operations leading to the Magnum opus:
midrashlm. calcination, dissolution, sublimation and
Perhaps, however, Reuchlin wanted distillation. Thanks to him, names were given
ultimately to prove to .[ews that Christ Jesus to various voiatile substances - metals, stones,
was the Messiah and convert them to vitriol, borax, sa1ts. His own laboratory was
Christianity, whose holy language was Latin, well equipped with flasks and phials, glass
not Hebrew. The anti-semitic purges lvere rile crystallizing dishes, water-baths, alembics,
a1l over Europe: Hebrew invited trouble. cucourbits and naphtha 1amPs.
If he were alive today, Reuchlin would He had specimens ol all the metals then
surely fit in with any number of schools of knorvn, plus all sorts of stones, pyrites,
meditation, chanting the Divine om or working malachite, lapis 1azu1i, oxides and 1eads. Like
a magical mandala while sitting under a glass his forerunners. Rhazes believed that all
pyramid at Glastonbury. See also Cabala; substances consisted ol the lour elements and
Cornelius Agrippa; Dee; Midrash; Pico della that metals contained mercury and sulphur.
Mirandola. But he anticipated Paracelsus by suggesting a
third ingredient, a 'sa1ty substance'.
oh-"l:-'- One ol the first to record detailed case-
I:: : In
--
l ??') histories, Rhazes rvas able to define the exact
Abu Bakr Muhammad ibnZakariyya al-Razi, diflerence between smallpox and measles. Not
known as the 'Persian Boyle', was from only was he a practical alchemist, but he was
Khorasan or Raiy, near modern Teheran. Little at home with the Greek philosophers, writing
is known about his 1ife, which to the Arabian commentaries on Plato's Timaeus, and on
world was not important, but more is known Aristotle, Hippocrates and Plutarch. Muslim in
about his learning. This phenomenal name, he was arch-Muslim in sPirit.
alchemist-doctor was celebrated lot his Liber
Con tinens (al-Hawl, his unfinished Rl|l:Ir G:_:',s.? (',1',?
I',
encyclopedia of practical wisdom, edited by his
pupils alter his death. He first studied alchemy, A Canon of Bridlington, Ripley wrote The
mathematics, Greek philosophy and literature Compound oJAbhemy, which, on the authority

146
 Rose windows

J.,t-
(( ,,la (r'
"r
tl''' ' 1 "- :l.J
of his own text, was iinished in 1471. In his are united to them essentially.
great alchemical collection, Thectrum Conclusion 4:Whoever understands the two
Chemlcum Britannicum (1 652), Ashmole Sulphurs and Mercuries shall find that the
includes The Compound oJAbhymte, a most one is most pure Red Sulphur of Gold -
excellent, learned and worthy worke, written by which is Sulphur in manifesto and Mercurio
Sir George Rlpley, Chanon oJBridlington tn in occulto, - while the other is most pure
Yorkshire, conteining twelve Gates. white Mercury - which is true Quicksilver in
Ripley demonstrated the theosophical, manifesto and Sulphur in occulto - these
religious side ol alchemy, as behove his nature being our two Principles.
as a good canon, a 'learned and rare Conclusion 5: That if a man's principles be
Philosopher of our nation'. Just as the Trinity true and his operations regular, his Event
in the Godhead is Father, Son and Holy Ghost, will be certain, which Event is no other than
so the alchemical Stone is a triune microcosm, the True Mystery.
a union of magnesia, sulphur and mercury. In
Eirenaeus expresses Ripley's lrlotto &s: 'GOD IS
his prologue to the Compound oJAlchynte,
THE ONLY GIVER OF WISDOM, whether of
Ripley writes: 'O Unity in the substance, and
things above or things beiow.' The distinction
Trinity in the Godhead. As thou didst make all
between soul and spirit or psychic body was
things out of one chaos, so let me be skilled to
not known to Ripley as a priest of the Roman
evolve our microcosm out of one substance in
Catholic Church. The exposition belongs to
its three aspects olMagnesia, Sulphur and
Eirenaeus.
Mercury.'Another alchemist, Norton, was later
to cite magnesia as one of the two substances
that combine with salt to form the Stone.
Ripley divided his Compound inro 12 cares
Y::::l*:
or stages of the Work: Gold coins, lirst struck in the reign of Edward
111(1327-77). Their value was established at
1 Calcination / Llnatron 6s.Bd. in 1559. There is an entry in the diary of
2 Dissolution 8Sublimation one Abraham de 1a Pryme, dated 1 1 July 1696:
3 Separation 9Fermentation 'This day I went to see Madam Anderson, and
4 Conjunction 1O Exaltation falling and talking from one thing to another,
5 Putrelaction 11 Multiplicarion shee ran and letched me down several old
6 Congelation 12 Projection coins to look at, amongst which ane was a rose
noble, one of those that Raymond Lully is sayd
Thanks to Eirenaeus Philalethes, who wrore
to have made [by] chymistry.'
Ripley Revived (1678), we have commentaries
on the Canon of Bridlington, praising him
highiy. Eirenaeus summarizes Ripley's
philosophy as Conclusions thus:
-Rll": Illil
A woman and author of A Pro.fessor oJ
Conclusion I : That as all things are Alchemy, on the alchemist Denis Zachaire.
multiplied in their kind, so may be metals
which have a capacity of transmutation o:.r_:'.11*'':
from imperlect to perfect state.
Conclusion 2: The possibility of Gothic circular windows, shaped like a rose
transmutation is because metals can be with 12 petals of relracting stained glass.
reduced to their first mercurial matter. Designed by the master-craftsmen of Chartres
Concluslon 3: That. two Sulphurs only are or Cluny, the glass was made from a secret
related to the work, and that their mercuries recipe using antimony. The windows have a
Rosenroth. Baron Knorr Von

curious translormational effect on those

contemplating them. Robert Larvlor compares
the tr,velvefold rose window with the
chlorophyll molecule, which is a dodecahedron,
the life-giver that transforms light into organic
substance.
In Sacred Geometry, the dodecahedron is
connected with the fiith element, erher, the
quintessence that Plato suggested the Creator
used in lorming the rvorld, to link the higher
planes with the lower world ol the four
elements. See also Chlorophyll; Dodecahedron.

o"11"1111 81101 Kno-rr u'i iiil:i?l

Rosenroth compiled the weighty Kabbala
Denudata benveen 1677 and 1684 by collecting
and translating into Latin man1, heterogeneous
Kabbalistic texts and extracts homthe Zohar.
including the Bahir and the Book oJ
Concealment (rvhich he thought r,vas genuinely
the work of Shimon ben Yochai). Apparently,
the devoutly Christian Rosenroth, lriend ol the
young alchemist Mercurius Van Helmont, had
hoped to convert Jews to a sort of Christian
cabala through his vast labour oflove. The
Denudatq missed its aim entirely, although it
did open the doors ol the Zohar to a largely
ignorant seventeenth-century public. Rosicrucian-alchemical emblem shou,ing the spirit of a
rose materializing fiom its ashes.

R":i:*:iil:
Members of the secret Brotherhood of the Ros1,
Cross, which appeared on the continent of
Europe in the sixteenth century. Many were
alchemists, but alchemists were not necessarily
Rosicrucians. The Brotherhood included
alchemy, magia and Kabbalah in their
traditions, the Ninth Grade of their ritual being
that of Magus/Alchemist.

old'llh u'
11 l' ? :?-,: ?)
Ol all the patrons of alchemy, Rudolpoh II was
perhaps the most passionate and
In occult chemistq.', atoms ol titanium, forming an
indiscriminate. A Hapsburg, he r,las both octahedron overlaid with 'arms'. resemble the old
nephew and brother-in-law to Philip tt ol Spain Rosicrllcian cross and rose.

148
 ,Runu

and great-great-grandson to the illustrious After t,,vo sketches by Arcimboldo shoiving Rudolph II
Maximilian I. Rudolph was cror,r,ned variously \\'earing a) the cro\vn lvith \vhich he rvas crorvned King
King of Rome, Emperor of Bohemia. Austria of Rome (No\,ember 1575) in Ratisbon and b) rhe crou,n
rvith ivhich he r,l,as crorvned Klng oi Bohemia (Seprember).
and Hungary, and Holy Roman Emperor. He 'Ihe latter was made
fbr Charlemagne and protrudes trvo
carried the burden ol too many titles, over tinger'rvidths either side oi Rudolph's head.
territories that lvere rich in minerals and
spectacularly beautiful. His glittering capital,
Prague, was a magnet not only for the cultured
o:.*'
but also for the political and religious misfits ll:."?!.--'.')
and for those on the make. Of Persian family, Jala1 al-Din Rumi was an
He was ambivalent in politics, religion and ecstatic poet and mystic, product of turbulent
sexuality. Buttressed by sycophants, he rvas times, during the trilogul-Turko history of
lavish in his giflts, although he was no fool. He Konya. A mystical alchemist, he transformed
built an observatory for his astronomers, through dance and sound his body chemistry.
\ studios for his painters, operating theatres lor Brought up among Sulis, the Islamic mystics,
a host of physicians and a well-equipped Rumi lounded the Mer4evi order of whirling
alchemical laboratory. In his chimerical dervishes, apparently to symbolize his r,vhirling
E pursuits, he kepr a court crammed rvith quest round the rvorld in search ol his first
wonder-gems, alembics, lapidaries and spiritual leader - who disappeared rvithout
v grimoires. He lostered mystics, mechanics,
poets and musicians in his genulne thirst lor
trace.
Dervish dancing represents the
knorvledge. Horvever, he had a habir of mathematical movement ol the cosmos, planets
knighting then punishing lailed lavourites. See and stars ln P,vthagorean harmony. liloreover, Den,ish,dance in
also Bohemia; Brahe; Croll; Dee: Gemma relation to sacred
Augustea; Grimoire; Kelley; Lapidary; geometry and
\,Vunderkammern. alchemical
translormation.

pllr
o"l1ld: *1::11
!:i:ir ::t:l:::t:h ::::l,tl
A father and son, both so named. Martin the
Elder (d. 1602) \vas a leading paracelsan doctor
at Rudolph II's court in prague and tvrote,
among other things, dictionaries of theological
and medical terms. Martin the younger
(d. 1611) took orrer ar court alter his father,s
death, edited his father's work and styled
himself - as rvell as 'personal physician to his
Gracious Majesry rhe Emperor' (i.e. Rudolph)
a 'cubiculo chl,miatrus', that is, alchemist from
the elevated seat ol the Emperor's theatre of
alchem1,. Martin wrote various tracts and
compiled the definitive Dictionary oJAtchemy.
Among very sensible entries on metals,
minerals and stones, Ruland reminds us that
the o1d astronomers dedicated the Emerald to
Mercury.
Ruthe;ford, Ernest

it is a form of prayer using the body as an axis. Rutherford, Ernest

Centred iike tops spinning, the participants
circle in geometrical patterns, moving in and
ll l ?1i: )ll'::'::!: ! l?::'':1::?:!)
out of each other in sequence of place and In 1919 Rutherford vindicated the alchemical
time. Harnessing the natural laws of gravity, doctrine of transmutation of chemical elements
friction, centrifugal and centripetal lorces, the by transmuting nitrogen into oxygen and
dancers tune ln to higher 1aws, whereby the hydrogen, through bombarding it with helium.
whole becomes more than the sum of the parts, 'This loud, unpolished colonial with the deft
a stillness at the centre ol the vibrating wor1d. hands', and collaborator Dr Fred Soddy
in such states, during all-night dancing-prayer (1877-1.956), radioactivists both, allowed that
sessions, Rumi wouid have interludes for transformation of one chemical element into
spontaneous discourses and poetry-making another was a possibility. Instead ol the
with his followers, about the inner nature of ianguage of alchemy, they used that of nuclear
life at the core of the Koran. physics.

150
 translation between Spain, Italy and Sicily,
expressly to learn Arabic and translate the
great philosophic and medical classics. He
became tutor to the Sicilian King Frederick II,
for whom he composed the phystonomla, based
largely on Rhazes's Al-Mqnsur and, showing
::1li1' how one's outer state ol health reflects the
Syrian pagans from Harran and translators of inner state and how to deal with it. Scot was
many Graeco-ES,ptian magical texts, which phenomenally versatile. He translated
were taken from Egrpt to the Middle East alter Aristotle's Ethics from the original Greek
the Islamic conquest in the seventh century. (anticipating even Grosseteste), the
The Sabians worked alongside the Christian evolutionary Averroes from the Arabic and
Nestorians, both sharing the Slzriac language, many a magical treatise, such as the Sirr-el-
the language oI iniliates. asrar of the Therapeutics, together with works
on necromancy and astronomy, such as the

It MTrsa:el
: gly:l w:'l.lr::l Mozarab Alpetrongi's Sphere (cumbersome but
avant-garde). His lilelong tr4agnum Opus
Ashmole gives a detailed description of a remained unlinished: his translation of
former window in this church which signified, Avicenna into easy Latin for the western
in coloured designs, the whole process ol universities.
preparing the Philosopher,s Stone. The designs, At Frederick's court, he was mathematician,
lvhich include man and woman, sun and alchemist, poet and astronomer royal. He
moon, a 'flair large red rose, a bright yellow translated, sang and inspired eventual
glory, and a man clad in red, holding a white followers who happened also to be his critics,
stone in his left hand, and a red stone in his particularly Albertus Magnus, whose De
right'. Anlmalibus is pure Scot; Roger Bacon, who was
so busy criticizing Scot's methods of
Salmon, Guillaume translation that he failed to review his own
{vl totally inadequare grasp of the intricacies of
11i:: :::T::::1 ::li: languages; and Pico della Mirandola, who put
The author ol the lashion able potygraphice, the up a horrified front over Scot's angel-magic in
art of transmutation of metals and minerals, his De Presagiis Stellarum, but then used it
and the DictionqLy oJChymical phllosophers. himselfl
Salmon was a practising alchemist and a logger A saintly man, perhaps even colludin.q with
of the experiments of others. Pope Honorius, Scot was nonetheless refused
the benefices he deserved. Understandably, the
Archbishop of Canterbury was suspicious of
'111 this 'E1 Dorado of the foreign clergr,, but so
The means whereby philosophic Sulphur was was his native Scotland. He became deeply
united with Philosophic Mercury. See also Dew; depressed and started to wear a metal cap to
Philosophic Mercury, Salt and Sulphur. prevent his own death that he had predicted
would be from a falling rock. He travelled back
to Scotland, where he died - whether under or
'l-'1:'lll3 "-l \)'ll _!'!?) not under a rock is left to the alchemical
An alchemist turned legend. An adventurer and imagination. See also Bacon, Roger; Frederick
traveller, who traversed the familiar paths of II; Pico della Mirandola; Therapeutics.
 Scryer

He \,vas apparently a Pole from Moral'ia,

?."v.7' possibll' a Rosicrucian involved in
A 'discrier', a seer or peerer into crystals; a dissemlnating its first tracts, such as the Fama
crystal-ball gazer, as rvas Edrvard Ke11ey, John Fraternitalis, or the Considerqtio Brevis ol
Dee's hoodwinker. Phllip i Gabella (perhaps he even r'vas Gabella)'
He studied in Krakor'v, the city where magic
Sendivogius, Michael lvas taught in lhe university and preached lrom
the pulpit, r,vhere the Faust of the Fqustbook
ll, iii!: u" l::: l:::l studied Chaldean, Persian and Arabian spe11s il
Peripatetic, maligned and mysterlous, this and coniurations.
colourlul entity, ligment or actuality, known as Sendivogius rvas certainly in Prague lor a
Sendivogius, was rumoured to be the greatest rvhile, reputedly transmuting gold lor Rudolph
alciremist ol his time. That Nell'ton pondered II, long enough to get thrown into prison at *
lor years over the Novum Lumen Chym[cLrm is least nvicer he appealed to be let out in 1597'
recommendation enough, even il that rvork He was indeed knor,vn to Rudolph's doctors, $.

\vas not bY Sendivogius. especially Maier, u'ho admired him sufliciently

His name got er,eryr,vhere, like Mercury to choose him as the last of his Tr'velve Heroes
slithering about. He appeared to know in the Symbola Aureqe Mensce.
Having paced round Poland, puilulating
everyone in Poland, Prague, the Palatinate,
Austria, Saxony, Greece, ltaly - the orient too, rvith puns and porvder ol proiection (Seton's or
it was rumoured. Like a spy, Sendivogius his own), he took - say some - to soldering
lurked in corners in his irogged iacket, cloak together ollcuts of gold and silver, covering
and Polish hat. Maybe he did co11ar the them with mercury and stamping them as
unfortunate alchemist, Seton, and clothe coins, so that he could go out into the market-
Seton's work as his ou'n. place, put them in a crucible to melt oll the
mercury, and - hey prestol - produce gold and
Sendivogius. alias silr,er coins belore the credulous crolvd'
$
Anonymus Sarmata (the Sendivogius 1ay lorv lor a r'vhile, then turned ,

nameless Poie). up in Vienna ifi 7617 , finally rvashed up in

Krakorv, Poland, in the 1620s. The gossipy
$
reporter, Brandau, wrote in 1650 that
Sendivogius n as still alive and married to the
rvidorv ol a successlul French alchemist rvho
had died in Prague. Nor'v, r'vith reservations on
the 'successflul', it could harre been one of three
alchemists: Kelley, Seton or Nicolas Barnaud'
But considering the unfortunate end ol the nvo
former, it r,vas 1ike1y to be Barnaud And he
rvas French. But the identity ol neither
Sendirrogius nor his wile ls certain, nor is the
date olhis death, although it is thought to $

be 1636. ril,

The r,vork that goes under his name (r'vhen

not under Lu1l's or Seton's), the Twelve Books
of the.Vew Chymical Lighr, is indeed
remarkable. It r,vas published lirst in Prague
and Frankfurt simultaneousl.Y (1604), then
 Seph/roth

Paris (1606) and Cologne (1610), the author Sendivogius gives exact parallels betrveen man
disguising his name in easy anagrams. 'inseminating' a \\roman and the lour elements
Sendivogius (if it be he) said the Novum being magnetized ro the earrh and projecring
Lum€n was drarvn lrom the lountain of nature their qualiries upon rhe margin or
and of manual experience/alchemical circumlerence. \Vhat nature cannot absorb, she
experiment: 'et nature fbnte et manuali spews up in stones and rubble: 'This is the
experientiae de promptum.' His tone is a btend lountainhead ol all things rerresrrial.'
ol philosophy, sanctiry and secrecy, based on a Furthermore, Sendirrogius examines the
thorough understanding ol horv man can combining ol the lour elements into metals,
manipulate nature and horv the four elements and the influences of the sun and the moon. He
interact. harks back to the nature ol the atom, the
He begins b), observing that in an age rvhen microscopic 'seed' rvirhin each bodr, 'that is its
deception and lalse alchemistic ,receipts' are 1/8200th part'. Having touched on modern
touted around, rvhen t,irtue and vice are not genetics and atomic theory, Sendivogius then
distinguished, rrue alchemr, is still to be veers ofl along Paracelsan lines of the three
respected. There are still a leur adepts, he belng principles: mercurv. sulphur and salt, to
one, r,r,ho should remain incognito. Sendivogius examine the alchemical Magnum Opus. See
rvarns readers that the esoteric meaning is also Faustr Lull; X,laier; Seton.
u,hat has to be understood. not ,outrvard
the
husk'olhis nords. He urges the adept, once seyhly retlirah ehe n??k of crealion/
the hidden has become manifest, not ro tell anv
unworthy person. He advises him to have the A bible fbr medieval Kabbalistic alchemists,
humllitl, to listen to narure and not io despise which probabll,belonged to rhe Geonic period.
the stud1, ol so simple a thing as ,natural It became so popular in the ninth and tenth
generatlon' - i.e. evoiution and reproduction _ ceniuries that Saadia, the Jer,r,ish sage
and by analogv, alchemical multiplication. Our (892-912\, \{role a commentary on il,
Iearning nou, is 'greatl,v superior to the anticipating A,laimonides. It provides the link
Ancients, save in one respect: they, kneur the behveen earl1,'m1,51i6 lewish literature and the
secret of preparing the philosopher's Stone'. Kabbalah ol the Middle ,\ges around A,,toses de
Sendivogius goes on to relate horv nature is Leon. Reuchlin is purported to have translated
divided inro lour 'places' and lour ,qualities', it into Latin lyell belore Postel's rrersion in
rvhich are in all things, yet do not agree among 1582 made it n,idely knorvn in the West.
themselves, as one is alr,vays strir,ing to obtain It formulates borh the doctrine of
the mastery over the rest. It is very important emanations - the 'splendours' that emanate
lor us to kno,,v nature's places - those that are from God - and the magic porver ol the
most in harmon1,. Like should act on like; if rve Hebrer,r, alphabet. The Sepher originated in the
\,vant to improve on nature, we must obserrre hierogll,phical alphaber rhat A,,loses enshrined
her, to knou, hor,l, she does it. lf, lor instance, in his Kabbalah. The basis ol the hieroglyphical
we want to improve a meta1, \ve must take rhe mysteries \,vas an alphabet in u,hich gods were
metallic substance, both the male and lemale represented b), letters; letters represented ideas;
aspect ol it. lt is as impossible to produce a ideas rvere convertible into numbers, and
metal out ola plant, as to make a tree out of a numbers were perfect signs.
dogl
Then Sendivogius investigates the ,seed' of
t"lhi1::h
narure, the essence. the generative porrer.
Natural growth is automatic; whereas man's A late Hebrerv r,vord lrom the root S-PH-R, to
growth is not: man has free u,il1 lrom God. number. In the Kabbalah, the sephiroth are rhe

1<7
(! -- -em Seton. Alexander

-\W
ten emanations or Divine Attributes through impressed, couldn't resist telling the local
lr,hich the Inlinite enters the Finite. They doctor, and gave him a piece olgold that had
constitute the fundamentals ol all existence, been produced from lead by Seton in Haussen's
and are seen as the ten principles lhat mediate presence on 13 March 1602.
between God and the universe. And so word ol Seton spread, ultimately to
By the early Renaissance, the Hebrew his detriment. He roved wherever 'the need he
sephiroth had become iused with Neoplatonic t'e1t to make Hermetic propaganda took him':
thought. Creation is envisaged as taking place Amsterdam, Rotterdam, lta1y, Zurich, Basel. En
in a series ol emanations, starting with God. route,he convinced such sceptics as the well-
From God emanates the lirst 'splendour', which respected Dr Wollgang Dienham of Fribourg
gives rise to the rational soul; lrom this and Dr Jacob Zwinger of Basel. Dienham's eye-
emanates a lesser splendour, which produces ',vitness account of Seton, directing him in the
the vegetable soul; lrom this, comes the powder-projecting operation, makes absorbing
material rvorld. reading. Seton, short and stout, with high
colour, red hair and French-style beard, in a
Seton, Alexander black satin suit, acted as Master of Ceremonies
to the two doctors, who were fumbling round
f i1r ::l:r:::r:l ::^::ry:l rvith lumps ol lead and sulphur bought by the
Another one of the rvandering alchemists. wayside and a crucible borror,ved from the local
cosmopolites, r,vho appear dotted over the goldsmith. Sal,s Dienheim, 'Although we were
landscape of alchem1,, either nameless or under as doubting as St Thomas himself, we did
assumed names. They traipse around Europe everything he told us', and the proiection was
and lurther afield, with their powder of accomplished. They ended up rvlth gold 'better
projection, performing alchemical Operations even than the excellent Hungarian and Arabian
and getting others to perlorm translormations gold'.
often on o1d scraps ol leading belore they Seton continued along his golden path
step back into the shador,vs, or get embroiled through Strasburg, Cologne, Hamburg and
rvith emperors and oflicials, propelled by some Munich, perlorming and 'multiplying', until the
uncontrollable zeal. They incur jealousy and curiosity ol Christian II, the young Elector ol
suspicion, then suffer imprisonment, Saxony, rvas aroused. When he could not elicit
punishment and sometimes a horrible death. the alchemical recipe from Seton, he tortured
Such is the progress oi this pilgrim, the him gruesomely with rods, burned him with
myrionymous Seton, variously Sethon, Sidon, meited 1ead, pierced him with needles and tore
Scotus, Sitonius, Sidonlus, Suthoneus, at him r,l ith red-hot tongs. Then lelt him to
Suethonius or Seehthonius. solitary starvation in prison.
And this is the myth. ln the summer of Meanlvhile, in search ol the Stone,
1 60 1 , a Dutch vessel lvas rvrecked oll the coast Sendivogius, an habitud at the elector's court,
of Scotland near Edinburgh. Some of the crew came to see Seton and rescue him, in exchange
',vere rescued by Seton, rvho received them into for Seton's red powder, his secrets and his
his house (cal1ed 'Sea-ton'), by the sea. He books.
treated them rvith great humanity and gat e Poor, weak Seton lasted in protracted agony
them the wherewithal to return to Holland. In another two years belore dying. The contended
1602 Seton visited the captain, James Haussen, book, Novum Lumen Chymiczrzn, rvhether his or
at Enkhuysen in Ho11and, and confessed he not, is an unusual insight into natural science
was a Master in Alchemy. He perlormed several and budding embryo1og,. See also Powder ol
transmutations. Haussen, understandably Projection; Sendivogius.

154
 Sod$t, Dr Fredeick

s,lel1cllh:d3t
A goldsmirh's lantasy of a cathedral. Beneath
the flying dynamics ol prophets, Miriam and
Mary and rhe Archangei Michael, is a
mysterious floor knotvn as Hermes' pavement.
The senex Hermes is presented as
contemporary with Moses. Instead ol the Ten
Commandments, he extends in his right hand a
book with these rvords on the open pages:
.SUSCIPITE
O LICTE&{S ET LEGES EGIPTII'
(Egyptians, support your letters and laws). In
his lelt hand, Hermes holds a table with
gobbets of his 'orvn' writings from the Corpns
Hermeticum, asserting that God the Father
made God the Son, in ',vhom He .,vas rvell
pleased, who is cal1ed the Sacred Word.
In this, the lvhole paving is meant to link
the lvisdom of the Ancients with Christianitv.

slgliyl":
External signs or'give-aways'. paracelsus,s
doctrine of 'signatures' is summed up in his
pithy sayings, 'That which iills the heart
overflou,s in the mouth' and 'in extremis
things rerreal their nature'.
Paracelsus belierres that people's inner
qualitles have external corresponding charac-
teristics, tvhich sene as signs through rvhich
Siena Cathedral: HERr,trs
everything internal can be discovered. This idea
\,lERCURIUS TRlI,lEI]]STUS
lies behind the notion that 'like cures like'. The in the pavement design
external manifestation tvould be a clue as to ol 1488.
rvhat is going on internally. The paradox is, the
ul:d:Tk
::1dI1 91 i1:' l_!?lu)
higher up the scale ol evolution, the more
Nobel prize-winner, lriend and collaborator of
hidden is the being's 'inr,vardness', yer rhe
Ernest Rutherford. This radio-activist, who
more unambiguous is its outer form. The most
lived in sensible Sussex. was not
hidden ol all is the essenrial core of man, rvhile
unsympathetic to the notion of the alchemical
least hidden is the inner nature of plants,
transmutation of merals.
which are obviously expressed in their shape
ln his Interpretation oJ Radium (1909\
and colour.
occurs this paragraph:

It is curious to reflect, lor example, upon the

:111:: remarkable legend of the philosopher's
One of the three base metals olten used as Stone, one ol the oldest and most universal
prima materia at the beginning of the \,Vork. beliefs, the origin of lvhich, however lar
See also Cupellation; philosophic Salt and back rve penetrate into the records of the
Sulphur; Prima Materia. past, we do not probably trace its real

I <<
 Solve et coagukt

source. The Philosopher's Stone was magnificent illuminated emblems of the

accredited the power not onlY ol N'lagnum Opus.
transmuting the metals but ol acting as the
elixir of lile. Nor,rr rvhatever the origin ol this
apparently meaningless iumble of ideas ma1' :1"ry
have been, it is really a perlect and very A number ol alchemists were burned at the
slightly allegorical expression ol the actuai stake, including Cecco d'Ascoli, alchemist and
present vie\,\,s we hold today. magician, in 1327 (Florence) and Giordano
Bruno in 1600 (Venice). Several narrowly
All this from rhe man rvho coined the rvord
escaped - like \,Vil1iam ol Ockham in 1324 from
'isotope' and pioneered nuclear physics.
Pope John Xxll lor saying the Pope rvas only
human. Knights Templar were reported from
time to time to have been burned at the stake.
::l:'.'-::ug"r1
The u,hole alchemical process can be summed
up in these nvo main principles: so1ve, analysis
: breaking dor,vn, separating; and coagula,
slnthesis : putting together the purified parts.

t:"t:l.rlr1:::l
A modern apparatus lor preparing
the herbal elixir: the lirst stage
rhat the apprentice learns in
alchemical operations. The
.(-Condener extractor has three parts * a flask,
an extractor and thimble. and a
condenser - and covers the rvhole
process ol relinement and
liltering.
The Rose ol the \\rinds, the eight pointed compass-star,
tllsv:i: in L'Acerba by'Cecco d'Ascoli, the alchemist burned at
the stake rn 1327.
<- exl(LLtnt
Derived from 'spao' (to
M,UI"
thimbl€, .ont4hino herbs
v
draWdivide) + 'ageiro' (to
gatheVbind), illustrating the _s:1lk'It .G'o !s'- .llu'.' . f ')
motto 'dissolve and bind'. Another An alchemist from Boston. alias Eirenaeus
ol Paracelsus's coinages lor his Philoponus Philalethes, r,vho migrated to
own particular style ol alchemy. London in 1650 rvith a number ol Phiialethes
manuscripts. He tr,as linked, if not fused, with
Splendor solis (The Eirenaeus Philalethes, but not twinned r,vith
t_plr:1o"| the Eugenius Philalethes, lvho lvas already
"f lun! trvinned!
Probably the best-knorvn of the out of this tripartite conundrum, it emerges
Soxlet extractor
alchemical allegories by Salomon ihat three major works were published under
Trismosin in the late sixteenth the name ol Philalethes: The Marrow oJ
century, made famous through its Alchemy (1654), Pyrotechny Ass€rted (1658)
 Sun

and A True Oz7 (writren in two rrersions at least, copper and illumined and illustrated with
between 1660 and 1664). According ro A.E. poetlc pictures', was intended not only to
Waite, Starkey was the author of the first part 'enliven the e1,es and spirit, but at the same
or poem in the Marrow oJAlchemy, but not the time a',vaken a very deep contemplation on
second, and still less of the Open Entrcnce and natural things'.
other notable tracts under the name ol The Latin rrersion, the Viridqr[um
'Eirenaeus'. Chemicum, had epigrams in Latin and again
used copper-plates fiom ]ennis's collection,
Iargel1, those already used in books by Maier
and N{ylius. Apart lrom these tr,vo rvorks,
Stolcius studied astronomy he had published
a speech about stellar influence on wars, Oratio
de Bellorum €x astr[sprqedlcatione, inhis
university days in Prague (1618) and it is
thought thar he practised a1chem1, and
medicine in England and in Danzig, and that
he was in touch rvith the educational reformer
The Philalethes trinitl, Comenius in the 1630s.

Suidas
s1.gh11_o'- ol:"*""dlia $1o 64t)
:l A famous Greek lexicon-cum-encyclopaedia,
A philosopher, mathematician astronomer and compiled c. ,rn1000 and containing a heterodox
alchemist, rvho was in lavour urith Herakleios collection ol gleanings in many hands lrom
I, an early Holy Roman Emperor version of histories, biographies, grammars and
Rudolph II of Bohemia, at Byzanrium. Alchemy doxographies of classical and Alexandrian
had become a theme for rhetorical, poetical and Greek rvriters. The Suidcts rvas a source book Sun or gold rvith the
religious compositions. Translormation ol gold for anecdotes compiled by the likes of Maier s1-mbo1 oi Sulphur
was now a symbol of man's regeneration and and Pernety in their mytho-alchemical connected to the moon
or silr,er rvith the
translormation into a more spiritual state. dictionaries.
sl,mbol of ,\ilcrcury ..

Sulphur
'i:l:i"::'1ii:1 !:i:!I ::::::::l:l :::],ryl
AIso knorvn as Daniel Stolz von Stolzenberg, The male combustible
this alchemist and physician rvas a refugee principle. ln prime
from the horrors ol Hungary, 1615-18, and so matter it is
ardent an admirer ol Michael Maier that he contained in
collaborated rvith Maier's publisher, Lucas ordinary gold
-
Jennis, in Franklurt to produce in 1624 two See also i
versions ol an alchemical emblem-book rvhich Philosophic
would incorporate ad immemoriam many ol the Mercury, Salt
copper-plates by A4erian and De Bry used in and Sulphur.
Maier's rvorks earlier. Stolcius's books rvere his
Chemical Pleasure-garden (in Latin) and his to1
Little Chemical Pleasure-garden (in German).
The latter, the Chymtsches Lustgcirtlein, The symbol ol Gold.
decorated rvith 'charming iigures engraved in Worshipped in Egypt by
 Swedenborg, Ernanuel

?=m,
lollorvers of Hermes as Amon-Ra at Heliopolis. been initiated into a masonic lodge with
He was depicted rvith a harvk's head politico-cabalistic aims.
surmounted by a solar disk encircled by a 1743 was Swedenborg's Gnnus mirabilis.
uraeus (cobra), and carrying the ankh (iife). He later \\rrote to an English Clergyman about
Amon-Ra at Heliopolis was the personification the event he noted at the time:
of the evening sun at the end ol the creative
I have been called to a holy oliice by the
process. See also Philosophic Mercury, Salt and
Lord Himsell r,vho most graciously
Sulphur.
manilested Himsell in person to me, His
sen/ant, in the year 1743, r,vhen He opened
E*u"u-:l
:*:d:"l:'st ! l?*', -l"') my sight to the view ol the spiritual world,
and granted me the privilege of conversing
The son oi a deeply derrotional Bishop and
rvith spirits and angels, r,vhich i enioy to
Dean of Uppsala University, Sweden, tvho in
this day.
certain superficial rvays resembled .fohn Dee.
Both rvere diplomats to the Continent, advisers Thereafter. he 'rvent Hermetic', and embarked
to the reigning monarch, r,vriters on on a lile ol spiritual alchemy, translorming his
philosophical and spiritual subjects, interested being through prolound contemplation ol the
in alchemy and, chiefly, both communed lvith Bible and renouncing al1 his prolessional stud-
angels. But Srvedenborg's personality was a ies ol material science. His helty Arcana
dillerent matter. He had no 'alter ego' egging Caelestia (1749-56) expounds rather like the
him on, no Kelley with a crystal ball, no oid midrashim on the Torah, a Kabbalistic corn-
paraphernalia, seals and sigils. mentary on Genesis and Exodus. It translates
He was a modern scientist and anatomist, into Celestial Secrets or Hidden Lore of the
no less than an explorative alchemist, probing Heavens.
into the physical properties ol minerals and In the year belore his deathhisVerQ
metals and their relationship rvith Christianq. Religio (The True Christian Religion)
metaphysical properties. His opercr contained a summation ol his beliefs that 'God
Philosophica et Mineralia (1 734) on metallurgy is One in Essence and in Person, in r,vhom is
and his oeconomla Regni Animalls on human the Divine Trinit1,, and that He is the Lord God
analomy rvere read widellr over Europe, the Saviour Jesus Christ'.
particularly the major section on the brain. Not The Theosophical Society that sprang up in
only did he devote many years to external his wake in \iVellclose Square in London's East
studies into animal nature, but he was also End had a huge impact on William Blake, lvho
exceptionally interested in the nature of'soul'. joined it in the 1780s.
He examined both physiologically the cortical
substance of the brain and psychologically the tvyth.?
brain as the exclusive seat ol higher psychical ."1u
lunctions. His insights into this, put in \Vord used by Iamblichus [o mean signs or
perspective cosmologicalll,, roused enough tokens ol the Gods, through r,vhich they express
respect lor the Royal Swedish Academy tn 1.907 their por,ver.
to publish extensive collections ol
Swedenborg's rvork on geolog,, chemistry,
physics and cosmology.
trii'
Travelling extensively and mysteriously S),rian, the language through u'hich alchemy
r,l ith freemasons in 1738 lo Italy for u,as transmitted from Greek to Arabic; a
hieroglyphics and at other times to Amsterdam, Semitic language ol the eastern borders of the
London and Prague, Srvedenborg seems to have Mediterranean, cognate rvith Phoenician,

158
 Syriac

Aramaic and Coptic. In Eg/pt during the From the lilth century onlvards, the Syriac
Eighteenth Dynasry (1567-132Oec) Syrian was scholars rvere mainly Nestorians. Their major
the language of a conquered people and under literary works were their peshltta or Old.
the influence olhieroglyphs. Syrian deities, on Testament (,rn464) and their translations of the
the other hand, had huge cult follolvings in Greek classical and alchemical texts. They took
E$/pr ar thar time. these with rhem on rheir persecuted treks from
In later dynasties alter the conquest of Constantinople and Edessa to Nisiblis,
Alexander rhe Great in 332-32!sc, Egrptian
Jundeshapur, Damascus and Baghdad, rvhere
was superseded by Greek as the language of two Syriac giants ol alchemical translation of
culture, until the lirst centuries eo, when Coptic the ninth century produced their work: the
(Christianized Egyptian) and Syriac rvere Hunayns. The comings and goings olJervish
revirred as liturgical and literary languages. The and Syriac sages over the rvell-beaten path
lirst-named disciples of Christianitlz drvelt in betr,veen Babylonia, Syria, Egypt and Spain is
the Syrian toll,ns of Antioch and Byblos, long documented in The Book oJWays (,ro84Z) by
the centre ol the papyrus trade. They sarv their the Postmaster General of Baghdad, ibn
r61e as disseminating all learning whether Khurdadbih.
classical, alchemical, magical or Christian.
 could lead to shape-shifting. The Chinese
believed (1ike all peoples) in the porver of the
drar,l,n line. Imbued with incantations, a t\\ro-
dimensional lorm could become a
three'dimensional embodiment or talisman.
Tabarmq
TaJgsm.s_
The ml,sterious ingredient that is absolutely
necessary ln the making ol gold, mentioned in Aramaic paraphrases ol the Hebrer,l Bible.
the wonderlul Muslim tale about a den,ish u,ho
made a 1ot ol mone1,'sonning people into
bul,ing 'tabarmq': it rvas really a glutinous mix J1-:rwic llde:
ol iish-g1ue and charcoal - a complete fake. From the term'tattwa', Hindi for'vibration'.
Each level ol consciousness has its ou,n
rllmud vibration or 'tattwa'. The rhythms, courses and
Taoist calligraphic
spiral ol magic
florv ol energies both in the human body and in
reflecting the lines From the Hebrerv L D : to teach; the bodv of
X,'t the universe are the tatfivic tides. The
traced bv a shaman's lewish traditional law consisting ol the mishna correspondence
t'eet in the dance . The (precepts) and the gemara (commentaries). betr,veen the
cun,ing lines allou,ed
planetaryr
man to contact the
spirit u,orld. The thin Taoist calligraphy systems and
lincs represented cosmic cycles
heaven, the thick ones Chinese handrvriting drawn lrom the magical and the human
the earth. principles of Taoism, rvhereby shape-drarving cycles is the
basis ol the
Hermetic'as

\'L-------rt
above, so
belon'. In the
West, the florv
ol the tattlvas
il
/\\
\\ (\ \\ \\ iElEr
(=_-r1 / in the human
body r,vas

\\
M#ir
&R
"-YL n
>1/\
knorvn as the
'humours',
corresponding
to lhe heavenly
4Re"e
N

lf
,>
^
\v--->,r ^
AE
/"z
"))
\{E
/oc],)
tatt\\ras, the
zodiac rising
and setting oi
The psl,chic centres of the body.
associated rvith the chakram and
the planets.

@6-)
1l

sun, moon and

4,(.%,
.4, (gr
constellations. See also Chakra; Emerald
Tablet; Galen; Physic; Planet.

av
((----'/4
C-// \-
(-/r-J/1
\_-.2
I

rh.1um_lluJsv
t a3
ffirs
</a
m)+
ra-'51 v\l 'Rea1 artilicial magic', according to

@r CAI
t/ ,rrs- Campanella. Dee's 'Thaumaturgike' was his
 Torah

expression lor the art ol making machines, i.e. Thoth

Boethius' brass srarue of Diomedes playing a
trumpet, or the moving statues that Hermes The God of Letters, the Measurer, olten
Trismegistus described in the Escleplus, or depicted carrving a staff marked with a cubit.
Albertus N4agnus' speaking brass man, or De The ibis was sacred to him, and ibis-headed
Caus' sighing sratues in the gardens at statues were common. In Hermes's chiel tempie
Heidelberg. Real thaumaturgy was the applied at Hermopolis, many mummifled ibises have
science of mechanics, of robots. In the been found.
Renaissance, science lvas given a prod by A11 scholars agree that Hermes Trismegistus,
people's interest in magic. the farher ol alchem1,, r,vas the same as the
E$/ptian Thoth. Even Isaac Casaubon, the
rh-'li!"'li:: seventeenth-century debunker ol Hermetic
texts, did not deny rhe possibilitl, of an ancient
Rosicrucian healers, in the sense that Maier sage cailed Hermes Trismegisrus.
used the term. Therapeutics go back to the The idea ol the writings of Thorh is very old;
'Therapeutae' ol rhe School of the Essenes in it goes back to the Eighreenth Dynasry
Alexandria, who studied ancient Hermetic (1567-13202c). Plutarch and Clement ol
writings. Renorvned as Sun-worshippers, they Alexandria refer to the Writings oJ Hermes, and
rvere codified in the precious Sirr-el-asrqr even though the rvritings in the Book oJ the
(Secret oi Secrets), an alchemical book at one Dead may not much resemble the later Corpus
time ascribed to Aristotle but thought ro have Hermeticum, there could be a connection.
been rescued lrom an aged hermit ol a Sun
temple built by Esclepius. The Strr is devoted to

v the body beautiful, to the relationship berrveen

bodily and spiritual disease and to the r,vays ol
!:*:":'
Ol all rvorks throughout recorded time, this ls
curing one through the other, tvith the help ol
the one that influenced alchemists most.
metals and plants and their auspicious
Written by Plato, it has the flavour of a creation
correspondences rvith the planets and stars. As
myth that can't be proved or disproved. It is the
above, so belou,, the text is enrirely therapeutic
equivalent of Stephen Hawking's Black Holes
in tone. See also Aristotle; Esclepius.
and other modern phantasmagoria. Plato said
that the Timaeus is the best expression he can
lh:"1sv manage on Creation and all questlons you
mlght want to know. lt is nor subject to
Angel-magic or mortal flolly? Theurgr was
opinion so lvon't go out of date. It incorporates
)ohn Dee's form ol angel-magic: conjuring up
a r,r,hole code of science that is not empirical,
angels on three dillerent levels. The lor,vest
but rather alchemical, about things changing
level rvas to tinker r,vith the natural world, the
into each other.
next level \,vas to tap into the mathematical,
celestial lvor1d, and the highest, on a letel with
Gods, r,vas to communicate with beings in the 133n
supercelestial realms.
Critics ol Dee and Cornelius Agrippa Originally the ,uvord meant the teaching and
maintained that theurg, rvas interference, judicial decisions given by ancient Hebrew
when all was said and done, rvith the unirrerse, priests as a revelation ol Divine Will, the word
and that such tamperings at the best played Torah came to be used lor the body ol the
tricks upon the imagination, and at the worst, Jewish Law, and linally the Penrareuch (the
u,ere et il. lirst five books ol the O1d Testamentt.

161
 Tr[ckster

ITf':: volatile, winged) in order to reach the perlect

sun-state of consciousness (gold).
The transformer. In alchemy, Hermes, identified
with the Egrptian Thoth, was the catalyst for Trismosin, Salomon
this, being a trickster himself: a moon-god, (fifteenth or sixteenth century)
subconscious, silver, quicksilver. In
transmuting from Mercury into Hermes, he has A more obscure teacher of Paracelsus than
to cross the borders of the unconscious (moon, Trithemius, Trismosin claimed to possess the
'Catholic tincture and medicine'. It is said that
his real name was Pleifler and that he was sti11
alive at the end of the seventeenth century. At
La Toyfon c{Or least, those are the reports of a French traveller
who said that he had seen him.
The two alchemical works ascribed to
+'
ttgure 2o.
/ Trismosin have been the source of endless
ediring. exrracring, cataloguing, printing,
backing and advancing. The Golden Fleece, ltrst
printed in German (1598), contains an auto-
biographical fragment attributed to Trismosin;
whether the rest of the text is his is open to
question. ln 1602 a portion of the German
work was translated into French, and partial
versions of this French text came out in English
(kept in the Sloane Collection). Moreover, in the
Ashmolean Library, there is an English trans-
lation of extracts from the French by William
Backhouse called The Flower oJ Treasures .
Splendor Solis is a priceless volume (in the
Harleian Collection) with very beautiful,
painted pictures. This text is extant in three
languages. There are several printed editions
and at least three manuscripts. Kegan Paul
reprinted the Engllsh version (1921), with black
and white plates replacing the Harleian
illuminations.
To complicate matters, tn(e Splendor Solis
forms Part 111 of the original The Golden Fleece

(A.ureum Vellus) of 1598 abovel In recent times,

the whole collection has come to be considered
as spurious, and Trismosin as fictitious. The
autobiographical preamble could be a
publisher's device to introduce the tracts
that iollow.

Pictorial anaiogr of purification by water in the

alchemical process. Alter a sketch for a French version of
.Articb fecotd. The Golden Fleece.
 Tnthemius, lohannes

I11l:'l':-: l:ryi.::_ i ! ii? .! ? l?)

The abbot ol Spanheim and \,Vtlrzburg. Upon
him rests almost the entire magical tradition in
alchemy during rhe Renaissance. His influence
outshines virtually every other magus.
Significantly little is knorvn about his person,
his habits, his magical Operations, his lectures
or his movements. He was a Benedicrine monk
of irreproachable orthodoxy (to the outside
world) and of unimpeachable conduct. He was simplified SteganographiG andyariant o\ De Library. sixteenth
the instructor in alchemical theurgr to both Septem Secundadeis ,\. Trithemius wrote as a
century.
Cornelius Agrippa and paraselsus. historian, not an astrologer, and this work took
He understood hypnosis and telepathy the form of a chronicle, based on the periods of
(today he would be thoroughly at home wirh archangelic rule starting with 52O6nc as the
radio signals and electronics), and lectured at creation ol the world. Ir is a hisrory ol Time,
the University ol Basel, where apparently with archangels guarding each period ol seven
Paracelsus was first inspired by him. When he cosmic years (by our reckoning, 554 lzears and
Steganographic signs
became Abbot of St James, Wtirzburg, he lour months). So Oriphiel, Anael, Zachariel, such as Trithemius
initiated Paracelsus in magic and proof-read Raphael, Samael, Gabriel and Michael took used.
the manuscripts of the Occult philosophy lor
Cornelius Agrippa, giving him the apt advice:

,Md+fr,
:SI 'Speak of things public to the public, but oi
.;-,. things lofty and secret only to the loltiest and
most private ol your flriends. Hay to an ox and
sugar to aparrot. Rightly interpret this, lest
you, as some others have been, be trampled
down by oxen.'
Trithemius was more discreet than his
'venturesome disciple Agrippa'. Al1 his magical wawil +q,,c
works concentrated on concealing mysterles.
He wrote a history of magic entirely in
pantacles enritled Veterum Sophorum Slgilta et
Imagines Magicqe, while inhis Steganographia
(1506) and Polygraphla (1502) he gives the key
Ml..;
'-is
.. !
;u
to all occult r,vritings and in veiled terms
explains the real science of incantations and
invocations.
One monarch .,vho was bitten with curiosity
1r,*/Mott'ff
about magic was the great-great-grandfather of

r*
Rudolph 11, Maximilian I. He cross-questioned
Trlthemius on theological matters, so
Trithemius replied in his Book oJEtght
Questions (1515), but he had a speclal matter
2.4,
that would be useful to the Emperor: ,le
Sept€m Secundeis, id est Intelltgentils sive
spiritibus orbes post deum moventibus (a

163
Turba Philosophorum

turns to have his corresponding planet and day no one can apply the tongue with impunity to
of the week. By Trithemius's time, it was its surface'. See also Xenophanes.
Samael's turn (from the year eo1171 to 1525)
and his planet was Mars; his day, Tuesday. r*:ll:
Thereafter, said Trithemius, it would be Gabriel ":1:::
from ao1525 to 1879, with the Moon and Michael Maier's choice ol 12 alchemists were
Monday, loliowed by Michael from AD1B79 to recorded in his Symbola Altrece l,'[€nsn€
2233 wrth the Sun and Sunday. Duodecim Nationum (Contributions to the
Although Trithemius wrote in a practical Golden Table by Alchemists of Tr,velve Nations).
way, he did include, after the manner of The L2, in roughly chronological order, are:
adepts, his pantacle symbol (rather like Dee's Hermes the Egyptian, Maria the Jewess
Monas Hieroglyphica) in this manuscript, of (identified as Miriam, Moses' sister),
which a lew copies survive. The work',r,as later Democrltus the Grecian, Morienus the Roman,
published in German as Von den siben Avicenna the Arabian, Albertus x'Lagnus the
Gq/st€nater Engeln (Of the Seven Holy Angels, German, Arnoldus Villanovus the Frenchman,
Nuremberg, 1522). A Czech version of Thomas Aquinas the Italian, Raymond Lully
Trithemius's works, presented to Maximilian, the Spaniard, Roger Bacon the Englishman,
appeared almost at once in the Royal Library at Melchior Cibinensis the Hungarian and
Prague. His magical lormulae sparked off not Anonymus Sarmata.
only Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus, but also Maier presented the 12 not so much in a
Reuchlin, Pico and Dee, rvho exclaimed 'slmposium' as has been suggested by the
with relief on acquiring a rare copy ol the word'Table'(.l\ensae) in the title, but in 12
Steganographla at Annverp (previous haunt ol books, each devoted to one of the 12 disciples
Cornelius Agrippa), where he spent ten days oi alchemy. The format within each book is
copying the text. thesis, antithesis, summing up in fatour of the
Trithemius's 1ibrary alone was a source of alchemist. Most of the heroes do not need
wonder. His great friend Bishop Dalberg led much interpretation, apart from the last two.
Reuchlin and friends on a 1ibrary trip via Melchior Cibinensis is Nicholas Melchior ol
Worms and Oppenheim to the 1ibrary of Swabia, the flifteenth-century composer of an
Nicholas of Cusa, then on over hill and dale to al.chemicall{ctss dedicated to his patron
Spanheim to absorb and copy the magical Ul6szl6ll, King olBohemia (1471-1516) and
collection of Trithemius's manuscripts in five of Hungary (1490-1516). This,4[ass inspired
languages. His greatest sources of wisdom Maier in his Atqlanta Fugiens. The picture in
included such books as the Picqtr[x, the Teucer the Symbola accompanying Melchior Cibinensis
astrolog, ol Ibn Wahshilrya and early shows a devout priest in lull regalia celebrating
Kabbalistic midrashim. the Eucharist, lvhile a strange and podgy Virgin
to the lelt is suckling the Infant Christ. Perhaps
Turba Philosophorum 'earthy'rvould describe her better, lor she is
also Earth suckling the child Mercury.
An imaginary alchemical debate benveen nine A1chemical1y, the'cib' in Melchior's name
Ancient Greek philosophers. originally recalls the 'cibation' stage in the Magnum
composed in Arabic, it appeared in Latin in the Opus, rvhich is the 'suckling' and results in 'an
thirteenth century and immediately became increase of whiteness and redness, goodness
popular. After a debate on the Alchemical Art and quantity and a complete laying bare of the
and the indispensableness of the Stone, the variety ol colours', before sublimation. The
Turba ends with a description olthe Stone as Communion that Melchior (whose name evokes
'lvhite, vo1ati1e, concave, hairless, cold, and yet the three Magi) is celebrating is the alchemical
 I\,velve Heroes

/.ii..)v"
translormation of bread and wine (white and
red) into the body and blood of,Christ. The
sacrament at the altar is the sublimation of the
'red state' and the Christ child is the birth ol
the Philosopher's Stone.
'Anonymus Sarmata' is identilied as
Michael Sendivogius the Pole, contemporarv
with Maier. In Roman times, Sarmatia was the
country of the Sarmatians, barbarous Iranlan
people living to the sourheast ol Russia.

Cibation the Earth suckles the child t{ercury. After a

detail fiom the fronrispiece to Maier's book on Melchior
Cibinensis in Sybold Aureae ,l/tensce Duodecim Nationum.

t -i,3 s

-a-

165
 oJGold. Umail is also quoted by [i1daki, the
fourteenth-century metaphyslcal alchemist
from Cairo, in his rich material collect.ed in The
End oJthe Search.

"1::1d
The alchemical author of the Coelum
'll:il'
An old university torvn in Sweden and the
Philosophorum (The Philosophers' Heaven, original capital ol the Kingdom of the Sviar: a
Strasburg, 1528), which u,as published by the surprising place lor an Arabian alchemist to
same Gruninger lvho had published surface in the seventeenth century, but that is
Brunschwick's Buch zu Distillieren (1519) and exactly rvhat happened to Avicenna. A
who shamelessly lilted the woodcuts from Professor in Medicine at Uppsala, Peter Kirsten
Ulstad and from the Distillieren lor other books (157 5-1640) , wanted to study Avicenna's
that he published later, such as the two Cqnon in the original - not being satislied with
versions ol the Summa PeSfuctionis assumed to the Latin. So he printed part of the C(tnon in
be Geber's (1529 and 1531). Arabic, along rvith an Arabian grammar for
assiduous Swedes to interpret the text.
,tugh::s t44e) Uppsala, moreover, was the home ol the
!1:?: mystic alchemist, Swedenborg, and to modern
The man who made Samarkand a centre of times, it continues to promote the Hermetic
Muslim culture and lounded an astronomical tradition. In 1985 the university published an
observatory there, rvhere the sciences, alchemy
and philosophy could flourish again after the
centuries of disintegation in the r'vake ol
Alexander rhe Crear's devastarion.

:o' Y_'111:
*:1i"19 Emmanuel
Srvedenborg

One ol a brilliant group ol Spanish-Arab

scholars who flourished under the caliphate of
Al-Hakam II in Spain (961 976.\. Mohammad
ibn Umail lived in seclusion, but of his works,
The Sllvery Wqter and the Starry Earth is a
commentary on his own alchemical ode, Epistle tort
oJthe Sun to the Crescentl,loon. Both were
translated into Latin in the Middle Ages, The
Silvery Water (Tabula Chemica) contains many v"\
quotations from earlier alchemlcal writers and
\/
shows how Muslim alchemy accepted and
developed Hermetic doctrine. Umail quotes
Scryrngs oJHermes, some apparently from
Greek originals, others from tenth-century
Arabic writings. Ideas from The Stlvery Water
rvere taken larer by the thirteenth-century
alchemist Abu'l-Qasim al-lraqi for his
Knowledge Acquired Concerning the Cult[vation

166
 sir Thomas
{Jrquharr.
ffi,p,: J
W) - i,'
- tl-t':'t )'
important work the occult influences on is, as he comments, a 'mungrel' word, deriving
Shakespeare and other Renaissance men of from 'ek' + 'skubalou' (Greek for 'out of
,a letters, entitled Images oJ Regeneration and dung'1, and 'aurum' (Latin for 'go1d'): Gold out
written by Michael Srigley. of the Dunghill i.e. via an alchemical process,
the universal language.
As Hugh Mi11er points out, modern chemical
":f1 language with all its philosophical ingenuity is
In the famous scrying sessions of ;ohn Dee and constructed on principles exactly similar to the
Edward Ke11ey, Uriel is the Archangel who ones Urquhart divulged more than 100 vears
guided Dee in his Operations to summon before modern science constructs had been
angels from the celestial spheres. invented.
In the Bible, Uriel is chronicled among the .fust Rabelais, like Urquhart defies
sons of Levi (l Chronicles 6,24) , and of the definition. The full title ofThe l€wel is
sons, 121 in all, of Koharh the Levite. His Ekskubalauron, or the discovery oJa most
name means 'Flame of God' or 'My Light is exquisitejewel, more precious than diqmonds,
God', and in the Book of Enoch he is known enchased in gold, the like whereoJwas never
variously as one of the lour Archangels or one seen in any age,ifound in the kennel oJ
of the Watchers over the World and Tartarus, Worcester street, the day gfter the;light and six
the Underworld. He shows Enoch the miracles belfore the Autumnal Equinox oJ 165 I .
ofHeaven and judges over the fa1len angels. In The tale goes that, exiled in Zeeland,
the lost Prayer ofJoseph, he is the angel that Urquhart died laughing - at the news of the
Jacob wrestled with, eighth in rank from God Restoration of Charles II. His aims had been to
(lacob being first).

y::b:'::
The dragon that endlessly eats its own tail,
whose end is his beginning; the monster that
keeps the cosmic waters under control; Nahash
the serpent, and symbol olthe cyclical nature
of alchemical work.

Urquhart, Sir Thomas (161 1-60)

A dramatic Royalist soldier of Cromarty, and a

gentleman and scholar, who was not an
,\ alchemist but alchemized language. His
unreadable Eks kubalauron (The /ewel 1 652) is
)./) as quixotic and fiery as his translation of
Rabelais' Gargantuq and Pqntagruel, the
F. rollicking, enormous aside for which he is
Y justly famous. He was spurred into writing he
was /ewel when imprisoned by Cromwell's men
\ In the Indian cosmos, the uroboros is the cobra, symbol
af,ter the Royalist defeat at Worcester in 165 1.
of eternity. The mountain represents paradise, the earth
Urquhart's great plea is lor a universal
belorv it is supported by elephants, while the dome in
language, and his works evince every linguistic the centre is the infernal region supported by the
contortion to demonstrat e this. E ks kubalauron tortoise.
 UTSCI

restore the fa11en Cromarty fortunes, to get rich publisher, Lazarus Zetzner, first had his
by inventing a universal language and then to printing-house, belore he moved to Strasburg
replace Latin with a language that reflected the in 1613, and where he prepared the first three
presenr structure ol the world - without the volumes ol his huge antholos/ ol alchemical
inconsistencies of existing Ianguages. The texts, his Theatrum Chem[cum (1602).
possibility ol a 'logica1 and cognitive tool' as a
means 'to admit easie and quick entrance to u:chat:
the things themselves' excited a number of
philosophers ol that century - Francis Bacon, The eyes ol heaven, the sun and moon in the
Campanella, Comenius and Descartes, no less. Egvptian ml,steries.'Uatchet' originally meant
'the creen Thing', perhaps relerring to the
.,voad or to the green malachite applied around
the e1,es as protection. The lens ol the eye
focuses green exactly onto lhe retina. The right
eye was associated r,vith Ra, the sun at mid-
day, and the lelt eye was the eye ol Horus, or
Thoth, the iull moon.
Sir Thomas Urquhart

Lrtchars, the Divine E)'es, EE)'ptian amulets that

protected against the Evil Eye.

utTvia
From Greek'ou' (not) + 'topos' (a place) :
nou,here. The original political romance written
in Latin in 1516 by Sir Thomas trlore
(1478-1535) - humanist, Catholic and
biographer ol pico della Mirandola - and
translated into English by Ralph Robinson
(1551). Many alchemists dreamed olUtopias,
never-never lands and perlect cities, like Plato's
"::l Atlantis or Francis Bacon's New Atlantis,
a town near Frankfurt, the heart of the Campanella's Citta del Sole (lvhich r,vas round,
'alternative' book trade in the sixteenth and like the ancient Baghdad), or Andreae's
seventeenth centuries, where the alchemical Christianopolis. Rabelais' character Pantagruel

168
 ,', l

goes ro uropia to defend its inhabitants, the Map of Utopia, alter the
Amaurotes (Greek lor 'Obscure Ones') against 1518 Latin edition ol
the book. The hero is
the invading Dipsodes (Greek lor 'Thirsty Ones')
Hythlodatus lGreek
The rumour is that King Henry VIII beheaded 'hythlos' : nonsense]
More, the alternative Man lor all Seasons, while the chief city is
because he lailed to turn royal horse dung into Amaurote [Greek
gold nuggets. 'amaUrOS' : dim. not
easily discoveredl.

Sr/L]TE TABY'/8.
 my soul, that we are driven like vagabonds
throughout the earth.'

Iilllilii:1"111
A real or maybe not-real alchemist of the
'Tib:11 fourteenth century. Basil Valentine is literally a
The word 'planet' in Greek means 'Vagabond'. name to coniure with. 'O nous Basileus,' said
Plato felt 'the scandal of the planets' Plotinus, 'Reason is still king'. 'Basil' has many
particularly. He found it incompatible lvith connotations, irom King to herb; 'basilisk' is
divine regularity that there should be 'a parcel the alchemical serpent, the uroboros; 'Basilides'
of five disorderly vagabonds', especially as the is the Gnostic magus who took the 'negative
problem of human vagabonds and vandalism path' ol God-is-not; the 'Basilica' is the circular
had reached crisis-point during his lifetime in theatre and oratory where priests had audience,
Greece. and where Croll set his alchemical treatise.
So Plato set two philosophical problems: 'Valentine' is brave and courageous, so
first, how to deal with human wa),nvardness, Basil Valentine remains a magical cognomen of
and second, how to deal with planerary the man who put antimony on the alchemical
wayr,vardness; how to find the 'uniform and map.
ordered movements' that must surely govern The man is surpassed by his work. The
the cosmos; how to account for disorder in Triumph Wagen Antimoni[ is a truly great
order. It would upset his astral theologr to chariot, like the heavenly Kabbalistic chariot,
worship the stars if they could do no better the Merkabah, rumbling across alchemical
than set the visible example of irregularity. horizons. Ol all alchemical texts, it is among
The planetary wanderer is faintly echoed in the most important, the most resplendent. It is
Eirenaeus the Cosmopolite's lament for the the first exploration in anything like
plight of the alchemist: 'We pass through many investigative terms of a metal and its
nations like vagabonds and dare not assume derivatives. The Triumphal Chqrtot could have
the care of a family or possess any certain been based on Alexander von Suchten's De
habitation ... I grieve lrom the very bottom of Antimonit (1598) and issued in a later
Secretis
edition by one J. Tholde. The Triumphal Chariot
The planets. From left
by Valentine was printed in German (Leipzig,
to right: Moon, Mercury, 1604) along with other works edited by Johann
Venus, Sun, Mars, Tholde, the salt-manufacturer from
)upiter tumbling, an old Frankenhausen, rvho was thought to be
man hacking a chunk
Secretary to the Rosicrucian Order.
out of the rock, and
Saturn falling into the Whoever wrote it, the book is a true
foreground. (Variation mixture: part invective against quacks
on Kelley's metailine ('wretched and pitiable medicasters'), part
planets in his Theatre oJ experiment with the properties of inorganic
Te rre s t ria I A s t ro n o mJ/.\
and organic chemistry, part praise of antimony
('Antimony is one of the seven wonders ol the
world'), part praise of the self, and part
warning of the dangers ol handling antimony.
Disarming in style, daring and clever, the
words build to Paracelsan heights: 'lt is I,
Antimony, that speak to you ... In me you find
 Von Helmonr, Ian Bapilsra

mercury, sulphur and salt, the three great

principles ol health ...' The author gives a very
clear account ol how to make the Star ol
Antimony, belore descending into alcho-jargon.
Basil's Zasr Wtll and Test(tment. his Twelve
Kq,ts, his Azoth and his Meditations on the
Hebrew Letter Lamed haye been collected and
half-co1lected, in the expected editorial jumble.
His TWelve Kqts were issued firsr in 1599
rvithout the essential accompanying emblemsl
However, Maier arranged lor the emblems and
the unlocking Kq/s to be printed inhis Golden
Trtpod of 1618 (and 1625, when the Tripod
was included in Lucas Jennis'sl,,lusaeum
Hermetlcum).
The Twelve Kqts are detailed descriptions of
/' /ffi;\ \
the emblems that represent the preparation of
,6*'
prime matter lor the Philosopher's Stone. They
l{: \
are similar to nursery rhyme illustrations that

d[rffi
w
have long-lost meanings. There are two
separate protagonists, the King and the eueen,
who have quite separate adventures but
eventually link. The King (ordinary gold) is
fr f,Y} //
'devoured' by the wolf, anrimony, to become
purified gold and then the'seed olgold'
(Philosophic Sulphur), which is then used in
the process of making the Philosopher's Srone
by infusing it with purified silver (Philosophic
Mercury). Meanwhile, the Queen (ordinary production of new gold. On the principle of like The Ninth Key of Basil
silver) undergoes her own sacrifice of with 1ike, the Tweifth Key shows the Valentine.
purification by being heated with Saturn (lead) potentizing process taking place.
to become the Philosophic Mercury, which is The Twelve Kqts have remained popular
merged with the Philosophic Sulphur. The royal throughout the centuries and have been re-
pair then undergo'death'- putrelaction and edited in the twentieth centurv bv the alchemist
resurrection. Canseliet.
The most interesting Key is the Ninth, which
shows Saturn as Humpty Dumpry having his n:1': 8.
lall and losing his feathers, or volatility, as the _u1" ":, !?: _uylii!? !! ? i? .1 ?j!)
black crow gains supremacy over the eagle. The The scientist who gave a name to 'gas', as he
Moon, or Queen, as Philosophic Mercury, saw and pronounced it as 'chaos' in Flemish.
carries the ascendant sign ol the white swan. This is the man who studied willow-trees in his
Within the circle beneath her are the three garden and transpiration of plants, and
serpents, the principles oiMercury, Sulphur guessed at chlorophyll. In his belief that water
and Salt. Once the Stone is perlected and the \,vas theorigin ol the elements, he went back to
King and Queen are in harmony, as in the the Presocratic Greeks, yet this was more
Eleventh Key, it must be fermented with gold fonnard-looking than he realized. This
before it can be used in projection for the 'sceptical chemist' got into trouble rvith the

171
 Vaughan, Thomas

Inquisition when he tried to explain away the exact weight that the mercury had been. He
'magic' of relics and miracles. And yet he had describes the lvhole event with scientific
to believe the 'miracle' olalchemical exactltude in his Ortus .Medic[nae.
transmulation, lor he was one of those who
had a visitation from a stranger lvho left him u-n.u.gn?n
Title page tbr Vaughan's
Anthroposoph/a
some saffron-coloured powder to project onto :'no.'1: 1: .1 : ?:'?)
Theomaglca, his earliest mercury in a crucible. Van 'Doubting' Helmont The tr,vin brother of Henry Vaughan the Silurisr
work on magic and had to nitness that it r,vorkedl He opened the poet, this timid spiritual aichemisr was born in
alchemv. Iid of the crucible ro lind a lump of gold of the the parish of St Briget, Newton, and later took
refuge in Jesus Co11ege, Oxford, for ten years, to
escape the Civil War. Vaughan was a great
Welsh mystic, bookish rather rhan practising
the Art. He took on the name 'Eugenius
Philalethes' out ol respect lor his great
Hermetic Master, Eirenaeus Philalethes, whose
work he translated as Three Tracts oJthe Great
lne oJ Phi lo s o p h ers r Hum ane an d
.1,[ edic
"fo
Metalline Bodzes (published in its lirst English
edition in 1694).
Although he lived before the appearance ol
the K(tbbala Denudata brought lewish
Kabbalah into the open, he was lascinated by
Cornelius Agrippa, andhis Maglca Adamica
(1 650) is a history ol magic. However,

$ Clumiftty , and veti8d by a pracUcall Vaughan had not read much else by 1650 than
s Erc.mination of Ptrnciples in the Occttlt Philosophy and the De Vanitate,
d theGeatWcdd. Through these rvorks he contemplated
$ Kabbalah, particularly the image ollacob's
tf By Eugenir,r Philol ethet.
Ladder ascending to God, as opposed ro the
eternal rotations ol the Hebrew alphabet,
t which did not lead up but only round.
t Dan: I
Vaughan sarv alchemy as both spiritual and
E physical science, extending in scope from
g Many{hallrun to andfro' and kno,l { infinity to the mineral kingdom. He had a

t* ledge (hall be increa{ed. l' mystical concept ol the sephiroth: 'the lirst is a
I Spirit, the second is the Voice of the Spirit, the
{,
* Z oroafier ;n Ordc\l.
I.
third is a Spirit that comes iorth from the Spirit
and the Voice.' He confessed in his preiace to

$ Audi Ignis Vocern his translation ol the Rosicrucian manilesto,

G I' the Fama FraternitGtis, that he knelv nothing

& { of the Rosicrucians first-hand, an1, more than

,i r,oNDoN, ,lr
Ptintedby f.W Fat H. BluudrraGthe ,'l
tl
he did olKabbalah.
Gradually, Vaughan came into his own. His
O
,i C;ltle tn forn-hitt, t 6 jo. .f spiritual path led him beyond Cornelius
.t Agrippa and the Aesh l.lezqreth (Book ol
9$ f6{,f s+++6ts$$tf $fs+t{i { Purilylng Fire) as is reflected inhis Euphrates
(Waters olthe East) in 1655. He was more of a
 Vithoulkas, G.

Christian mystic than Kabbalist. He was lull of Leyden in 1520, 1532 and elsewhere in 1585
ideas, rather than practices, about the and 1613? They emerged no',v and then until
alchemical 'torture ol metals'. 1742, when a selection in German appeared in
Vienna, in 11 tracts. Villanova's heterogeneous
uil1l mish-mash recurs in nearly all the volumes ol
Zetzner's Theqtrum Chemicum . It seems that it
Vaults had a spiritualizing eilect on man, an is the prorrerbial nature of his utterances that
'envoirtement', a raising of vibrations. appeals 'Lifle conceives life' and 'nature
Christian Rosencreutz rvas buried in a very conquers nature'. However, one ol his works
eiaborate vault, whose proportions paral1e1 was serious enough for Manget to include in
those of the Great Pyramid and the Temple ol his Bibliotheca Chemica Curiosc. That is
Solomon. Trdat, the Armenian architect Villanova's Semita Semitae (The Narrow \iVay
(998 1001) olAni Cathedral, designed pointed of the Narrow Way), in rvhich he says that the
arches and vaults that anticipated European foundation of the Art is Solution, the reduction
Gothic by a century. of the particular body, whether copper or other
metal, into Mercury; this is the reduction into
Villanova, Arnau de (c.1235-1312) water that adepts reler to; the second secret of
rhe Art is the manilestation of earth out of
His liie is a question-mark: was he born in u/ateri the third, which is 'purification', is
Milan, Montpellier or Catalonia? Did he seek Putrefaction, to combine moist and dry; the
refuge with Frederick, King of Naples? Did he lourth is Ascension, rvhich 'aerifies' the earth,
die in a storm at sea? Were his books burned after which is the sublimation by fire. The
posthumously by the Inquisition of Tarragona subiimation 'brings forth a spirit, which is said
in 1316? What is his value as an alchemist? He to be Mercury'. The sublimed or calcined earth
is oft-quoted, but rvhat were his works, which sinks to the bottom ol rhe vessel, but it
grew in popularity after they were reprinted at contains the spirit ol mercury, the 'seed'. A
ferment is added to this 'seeded earth' and it
The planet Mercury encased b1'the uroboros receives a 'Sou1 lor the perfection of the
Mastery'.

vincent of B:u"11:.
f:.l.!?? .l'.i.?.
A respected Christian philosopher and
translator, whose trvo encyclopedias were
among the most popular sourcebooks lor

\q6
' A\,N
alchemists ol the lilteenth century day:
Speculum Naturae (Nature's Mirror, Strasburg,
1465) and Spearlum Quadruplex (The Fourlold
Mirror). These works contain a mass ol

\)t i x, quotations lrom Islamic writers such as the al-

Qazwini encyclopedists, rvho paved the way for
Europeans.

Y',ll"_"tlT: 9 lltYlilln ::lll'vl

2kmurtu{' one of, the most charismatic modern
homeopaths, r,vho came lrom Greece ln 1978 to

173
 Vivarlum

lecture in California, where homeopathy was able to retire to his birthplace and found his
virtually dead. '\uivarium'. Essentially systems-oriented (he
Like Frater Albertus, the mid-twentieth had, alter a1l, headed rhe whole ream
century alchemist, he saw all phenomena as managing the public system of Imperial Rome
threefold, with body, soul, and spirit, which under an alien king), Cassiodorus no,,v wanted
correspond to the alchemical salt, sulphur and to put in place his own system of preserving
mercury. and perpetuating his Latin culture. So, with
far-reaching vision, he embarked on his
,i"111:, Magnum Opus: his Scriptorium or school for
studying and copying the Classics, and his
'The House olthe Living', the monastery that
Monastic School, or school lor preparation into
Cassiodorus in his old age founded in his the religious life.
beloved native Squillace, Italy, by the Ionian The Scriptorium produced the last really
Sea. Flavlus Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus (c. massive library of the ancient world. The list of
490 - c.585), the sprightly scholar who wrore books that Cassiodorus prescribed in his
a Grammar when he was 9J, had been, like his Institut[ones rvas quite liberal: not only the
kinsman Boethius, a minister to Theodoric the usual religious rvorks of St Ambrose, St
Great, and had lived on the knife-edge of Augustine and St lerome, but also the Roman
Ostragothic politics. historians Lir,y and Cicero, and the poets Ovid
At length, alter the upheavals ol Gothic rule, and Virgil. Although the monastery and most
and the ultimate capture of Ravenna for ol the library dld not sulive Cassiodorus for
Justinian by Belisarius in 540, Cassiodorus was long, at least some of the classical masterpieces
rvere taken to Rome, and this r,vay reached the

St Ambrose
Renaissance alchemists.

voaylnaay!
A book on the Kabbalistic science of metals, the
lull title beingArs et Theoria Transmutation[s
,4,letctllicoe, cttm Voarchadumla proportlonibus,
muneris et iconlbus rei cccomodis tllustrataby
.Joannes Augustinus pantheus, a Venetian
priest.
John Dee was given a copy on 1B January
1559. It was nothing special in the literature of
alchemy - i.e. almost unreadable except that
ir showed an Enochian alphabet. It had been
published in Venice (April 1530), in paris
(1550) and in more reader-friendly reprints in
LazarLts Zetzner's Theatrum Chemicum (1613
ano 1059t.
fhere is a definition in Martin Ruland,s
Alchemical Dlctionary e612) of Voarchadumia
as a branch of 'alchemical metallurgr' to do
with 'auriferous metallic veins' and 'the
intrinsic fixed lorm and the natural yellow
colour of gold', and the nature of the

174
 Vok, Peter

Philosopher's Stone as a 'heaty, corporeal, summer gatherings at his palace in Kratochvil

fixed, fusible, ductile, ringed, rarified and and his secret sessions at his castle in Bechyne.
arcane substance of quicksilver or Mercury,. At loggerheads with Rudolph, he yet had
similarities: he packed his castle and palace
with alchemical wanderers - Dee, Maier, Tycho,
Y,?1 'llll Anhalt - and religious fanatics of wavering
The last in his line (since the death in 1592 of iaiths and uncertainties.
his brother Vilem) of the noble Rozmberk Finally, in order to escape the snares of
family. A liery occultist in the Bohemia of Rudolph, he traipsed to Trebon with 2J chests
Rudolph II, the lounder of anonymous secret full ol alchemical and occult books - whither
societies, and the husband of a rvoman ol he rvas follo',ved by the drop-outs lrom all
unsound mind. Europe who tramped the road between prague
All this added to rhe hvsreria of his wild and Vienna!
 Edward Kelley, the Turba Philosophorum and
The New Pearl. He has secured the admiration
oiJer'vish scholars lor being the only genrile ol
his era to produce works ol such standing as
his Holy Kabbalah andhis Secret Doctrine
* k::lhll ud-uIl nr) in Isrdel.
"'::' I|? ! !:!' In the lield ol alchemy, he deals with utmost
A Victorian supersaurus of occult learnin.q, thoroughness rvith the European tradition from
whose rvily wrltings well repay the eifort the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries, his
needed to decipher theml In an age before dry humour not missing a single nuance of
microfiches, computers and faxes, his library quackery or eccentricity. He rvell knerv about
documenlation ol alchemists and Kabbalists the Arabic and Syriac manuscripts in
shows meticulous accuracy and combing ol 'considerable numbers' in the libraries of
original texrs. His favourite words are those of Europe that 'have been imperfectly explored',
the sceptic: pseudonl,mgus, concatenation, but he was the lirst to admit his limitations.
putative, myrionymous, supposititious and having 'neither the opportuniry nor the
reveries. qualilications lor undertaking such a task'. So
According to Wynn Westcott, he was a he leaves out an)thing Mlddle Eastern, Indian
rather tricky man to live with, cantankerous and Oriental or from lurther alield that has not
and demandlng, but considering the fiddly been transmitted to Europe. But modern
nature of his research, perhaps he can be scholarship has stil1 not ploughed these lields,
forgiven. He was born in Brooklyn, Nerv york, except lor a little around the edge.
on 2 October 1857, the illegitimate son of a Dame Frances Yates's remark (in her
ship's captain from Connecticut, and Emma Rosicruclqn Enlightenmenf) that'Waite's
Lovell, 'an educated Englishwoman'. He was valuable work is marred by lack of critical
brought to England, to a Roman Catholic sense' is hardly fair, for Waite was the firsr to
upbringing olgenteel poverty and Pennlz check the 'uncritical methods' ol'several
Dreadfuls. There he then became interested in rvriters', and, as he said, he looks 'critically and
the occult and began to design his own tarot historically' not only at Rosicrucian symbolism,
cards. but at all occult symbolism.
For six months Waite was a member of the One thing mars this cobweb-sweeping
Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, but he was colossus: his poems. Obscurity could be
disturbed by their quarrels. He mot ed lrom lorgiven in him; doggerel not. They are best lelt
magic to mysticism. unread.
Hls phenomenal output is evidence ol his
diligence. His annals ol Rosicrucianism, ullliiil !1iil ill
freemasonry, Kabbalah and the continuum ol 'llg"l:
Hellenistic, Byzantine and Latin Alchem1, are A Lutheran mystic and Paracelsan alchemist,
punctiliously detailed. He is honest enough to who u,as in the German magical tradition ol
admit anything rhat is guessrvork and is Trithemius and Cornelius Agrippa. He preached
gracious enough to be ashamed of his own his ideas on Sacred Harmony rather too
youthful inaccuracies (as with his Lives oJ ardently lor his co-religionists. His works
Alchemists, written rvell before his classic Ifte circulated r,videly in manuscript, but when they
Secret Tradlt[on in Alchemy). were published posthumously in the
His Hermetic tvorks are voluminous: he seventeenth century, they were banned in
edited the tvorks of Paracelsus, Thomas Saxonl' although some of his sermons ended
Vaughan, Raymond Lul1, Martin Ruland, up in archives in Prague.

176
WINGED CREATURES

ln alchemjcal allegor;,,
creatures with wings
represent the volatizing
(flying up) ol metals on
the physical plane, and
the ascending ol spirit
(transcending) on the
metaphysical plane.

1 rHE pHoENrx,
alchemical symbol oi
the sun, transrorms and
renews itself b1r fire. lt
builds its orvn funeral
pyre, and sets fire ro
itself by turning its
bod1, te ii1. t* un.
flapping its wings. Alter
this self-immolarion, ir
rises lrom its ashes on
the ninth day.
Appllqud:
Dicna Tovqt-Khctn
2 rHE pnlcots links with the mercurial serpents ol 3 fHE EaclE generally stands lor mercury. Stationary,
healing (the caduceus), the uroboros and the it represents sublimation or fixing the volatile, r,vhile the
salamander, representing destruction and renewal by flying eagle volatizes the fixed. The aichemical eagle
fire. In China there were sea-dragons too, distinguished connects with Ashur the Assyrlan eagle god (rvhose crest
by five clar,vs on each foot. is deplcted as rvorn by rhe alchemist Ostanes), with
t n b ro i de ry ;,4,,1 L tl,,l W t l I ia m s Horus the E$,ptian sun god, and with the eagle'face of
the creatures r,vho bear the heavenly chariot in Ezekiel's

V Choma le t ti ng : D iana Fe rna ndo

s
4 prc,qsus, sprung alchemically lrom the blood ol the the pack-horse or kaballEs, bearer ol weighty secrets
snake-headed Medusa, symbolizes energy on every 1evel irom this tbuntain, particuLariy the sacred art ol poetry
(horse power) and passions to be bridled. With his rvhich is the secret art ol aichemical ianguage, cognate
mythical rider, Bellerophon, Pegasus tamed the with cabaia, the ianguage olhorse, cheval, chivalry' To
monstrous Chimaera by thrusting lead down her throat, the initiate rvho understood Pegasus' language, access
and u,ith a stroke ol his hoof, he translormed the Stone i,r,as granted to unknown regions across time and space

on the top ol Mount Helicon, releasing the lountain of Pa i n t lng : l,llchael B ram man

rhe Muses. ln cabalistic alchemy, Pegasus is Peg us,

 Westminster, /ohn Cremer, Abbot oJ

'-l-11'3llr l:w!::
Westcott, rvhose pseudonym Sapere
Aude
means 'dare to be wise', was another
imporrantVictorian antiquarian who held up
the Hermetic pillars in his Collectanea
chemica
in the 1890s. parallel to A.E. Waite, G.R.S.
Mead and Eliphas Ldvi, he helped pave
the rvay
for modern scholarship in Bablrlonian,
lewish,
Greek and Renaissance alchemy
and cabala. He
discovered the ancient Indian art of
chaturanga
(chess) and devised his or,vn chessmen
and
Enochian chess-game with occult parallels
to
the Indian and Egyptian games.
He unearthed the Chaldean Chronicles
oJ
Zoroqster as,,vell as Everard,s 1650
translation unintelligible alchemical writings before being
of the Divlne pimander. He presented to Ancient Egrptian lion
the late acquainted r,vith ,Master Raymond, in Italy. and unicorn playing a
nineteenrh-cenury English public what
Here and in England. during a Iwo_year chess-like board-game.
Berthelot was presenting to the French _ slay.
Raymond disclosed to him the whole secret Alter a satirical
revitalized occult texts. of papyrus, New Kingdom
the Great Mystery.
( 1 562-1 OB5ec).
Cremer's Testqm€nt purports to describe the
,::lrii:j:_11 cremer, Abbor of preparation of the ,living warer which
J:hl
Mentioned among r.t.ri, u"ri,rr-l
tnhis Twelve Herodr, Cremer figures"r.rr.^,r,,
as one of lohn Cremer, Abbot of

the triumvirate of Maier's Golden Triood Westminster, by his

alchemicai oven and
(.[ennis, Frankfurt, 1 6 18).
tripod bearing a
One tradition has it that this self-stvled Hermetic vase.
Abbot of Westminster was a Benedictine,
initiated by a Ramon Lull who worked with
him in Westminster Abbey and the Tower
of
London in 131 1. A certain Robert Constantine
alfirmed in 1555 that he had been shown
coin ofvery pure gold, under the name
ofa
a
t-
Raymond noble, which had been struck
from
the precious metal manufactured in
the Tower
of London. A.E. Waite rhinks thar both
Lull
and Cremer are masks, although there
is
something behind the story ol Cremer.
The title-page of Cremer's Testum€nt
presumably depicts the author,
vet rhe
illustration from the verv same plate ol
I o t S,
by the same firm, bears the title ,Thomas
Aquinas the Italian, in the 1624 printing
of
Stolcius's Vtridarium Chemtcum !
The Tesmment is only a felv pages long.
-
Cremer says he wasted J0 years reading
William and Mary

constitutes the life of our Art'. There is a recipe

using'orange-coloured arsenic and ':id:fi''"::i
Rabusenum', which could be chalybeate The 'Miracle Ha11s' or museum showrooms in
waters. Alchemists who worked under the the Palace in Prague ofRudolph 11. In his
auspices of Taurus, when the Magnum Opus craving for the sensational, the alchemical and
should be completed, were attracted by all red the sublime, Rudolph surrounded himself with
materials. all kinds ol exotica, crystals, lumps ol go1d,
In 1652, Ashmole published an engraving, fossilized reptiles, magic mirrors, grimoires and
apparently representing a hieroglyph that gemstones, bezoars and gallstones, boxes lor
Cremer caused to be painted on an arched wall lovers' pierced hearts, nodding statues and a
within the Abbey. Ashmole records that he: handful of the clay lrom which God made
Adam. Paintings by Bosch and Arcimboldo
met with it Limned in a very Ancient Iooked down on Rudolph's chained lion, which
Manuscript ... In it is conteyn'd the Grand prowled round his ante-chamber; gallows-ropes
Misteries of the Philosopher's Stone, and not swung, sundials shone and robots crunched
more Popish and Superstitious than and revolved. Rudolph was so keyed up to the
Flame11's Hieroglyphicks portraid upon an 'otherworld' that most nights he lvould ring a
Arch in St Innocents' Churchyard in Paris. giant bell made ol electrum magicum to
Notwithstanding, it has pleased some, to summon protective spirits, according to the
wash the originall over with a Plasterer's tradition of Paracelsus and Trithemius. He
whited Brush. quaked in fear of the astrological forecast ol a
death worse than his cousin Henry lll's (who

,itlil,1id *l'y died lrom a monkish stab-wound).

The royal couple who made a declaration about

the deslrability of studying alchemy. In view of
the Bank ofEngland being founded in 1694 to
look after the Government debt, it seems hardly
surprising. The desperate androgrne William-
and-Mary said the alchemical gold must be
turned over to their Majesties' Mint in the
Tower of London.

''"hl:g lull?ll:ll ll??? '?!

The son of the English lohn Winthrop, who
was portrayed in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter
and who led the Puritan exodus to America.
John Winthrop Junior became the iirst
governor ol Connecticut and a great astro-
nomer and alchemist. Following the Paracelsan
tradition of iatrochemistry, he was famed for
his medical practice, and was honoured as a
member ol the Royal Society in London.

After a drarving by Konrad Von Gesner of prismatic rocks

in Bohemia - one source for Rudolph's precious stones.

178
 ":::t11i:i li ?2?-i 1i3i,)
Another example of how a real, if nebulous,
person was transmuted through alchemical
texts into a completely different being. The
x original Xenophanes was an early Greek
philosopher who, transformed via Arabic and
The symbol ofthe cross, the body, or physical Latin, emerged in print in Basel (lST2) in the
matter. alchemical debate known as the Turba
Philosophorum (The Convention ol the
Philosophers).
The details of the historical Xenophanes are
uncertain. Born and bred in Colophon in Ionia,
he was compelled to leave as a young man. He
spent the rest of his life wandering, probably in
- some say Elea - as poet and sage.
Sicily
Xenophanes was the first to postulate a
unity in heaven and say, ,The One is God.' He
wrote on nature and physical topics. ,All things
that come-to-be and grow are earth and water,,
he says, 'and sea is the source ofwater, and
source of wind.'He comments on lossils found
inland, and everything being long ago covered
in mud. The sun he sees as a ,concentration of
Man and the zodiac. After a woodcut from Cornelius fire that comes into being each day from little
Agrippa s Occulru philosophia. pieces of fire that are collected'.

Upright or oblique, the humanistic sign

@ shows matter in spirir (rhe e is spirit, man The Turba
is matter). In the alchemical game of noughts Philosophorum.
and crosses, d ls the original glyph for lrtars, Variation on a pen-
drawing fiom a
showing matter dominating spirit, but
sixteenth-century
motivared by spirit lrom below. Q, Venus, is manuscript, 72a
exactly the opposite, with spirit dominating Ros€garden oJ the
matter. Many of the devices for gold in its Phi los o p hers, afi ributed
various forms are permutations of this rheme: to Arnau de Villanova.

Q is calcined gold powder. X is potable gold,

+O. is wire or thread go1d, for strings of
musical instruments.

xantho.sil

The yellowing; rhe third stage in rhe Operarion,

according to the Alexandrian alchemists, the
first two being melanosis (the blackening) and
leukosis (the whitening). The fourth stage was
iosis (the purpling or reddening). See also Iosis.
Xer[on

It is these ideas, by way of Aristotle, that Ximenes, Cardinal Roderigo of Toledo

find their rvay into the Turbq. Aristotle adopted
- and adapted the views ol his predecessors
-
illlT:l:l ::li:'v_l
Xenophanes, Empedocles and Plato and The first person in the West to write a History
crystallized them in his theory of the lour oJ the Arabs, published in 1625 in Leyden,

elements. Ol the two pairs ol contraries, air and where the cocooned north Europeans realized
earth, lire and water, he considered the latter to at iast that there had been, right through the
be more significant. A11 of them he sarv as European Dark Ages, highly cultured Arabian
interconvertible and all of them came lrom scholars, alchemists and scientists, not only in
prima materia, primordial matter. one 'body' the Middle East but also on their doorstep in
could change into another by altering the Spain. Arabian sages had been known to a
proportion ol the elements present. All nature small circle ol Western adepts, but Ximenes'
was stri\,lng lor perfection - a notion that rvas Histariq Sarccenicd had hitherto only been
directly in tune r,vith the alchemical concept available in manuscript.
that metals pass through a c;,c1e of grorvth,
until they reach pure gold. xifhlllnu:
Aristotle's ideas remained surprisingly
intact as they passed through the ages, in the A philosopher named by Edr,vard Ke1ley in
hands of the Alexandrine and Byzantine Chapter the Thirteenth ofhis Theatre oJ
alchemists, then the Arabian and Latin Te rre s t ri a I A s t ro n o my, concetni ng the' Pe rlect

medieval scholars, finally coming out through Red Elixir'. 'Xiphilinus and the rest ol the
the mouth of the Xenophanes of the Turba: 'EN philosophers agree in this, ' says Kelley, 'that
TO PAN,' he postulates again, although this the rvhite colour must precede the red.'
time he applies his 'One is A11' to the
alchemical process of Putrefaction, and
stresses the importance ol the lour elements
being together.

*:11:-i

Greek 'dry pou,der for wounds',

translated to 'e1-ixir' b), the Arabs.

xerxes I, King of Persia

l1 ii?-1!iTl
The grear king under u hose reign
alchemy, astronomy and magic
flourished. He was accompanled
b), the alchemist Ostanes in his
rvars',vith the Greeks, and
deieated at Salamis in 480ec. It
was ostanes rvho had had the
dream that the Gods demanded
war on the Greeks, and Xerxes
who had taken the decision to xerxes (on right) with ostanes who has on his head-
fullil it. dress the eagle headed rvinged deity Ashur.

180
 Kilg
li
More familiarly knorvn as I Ching (The Book oJ
Mlttat{on,\, this is embued tvith alchemical
symbolism, particularly the Hermetic
of Medicine hexagrams lvith the notion ol ,above, and
":1t:, -u,l:::-1: ::,k 'belolv', and the change from ,yin, to ,yang,-
The Nei Chtng, whose".O ,,,,. ,rrr.r,, lemale to male, volatile to fixed.
medical alchemy, goes back to 20Osc, if not
perhaps as far back as 26OOsc rvhen the \'lost culrures had their
mythical emperor is said to have been alive. Eook ojChange or Book
The book relies on a whole system of oJ Tran s,h rm a t i o n. Here

correlations between the ,universal quintet, of the process ol

coniuncrion (gold and
elements: water, fire, wood, metal (gold or
silver united b1,
cinnabar) and earth, and the main organs of sublimation) is
the body. All this is firmll, entrenched in Tao as allegorized as a
the supreme regulator of the universe. marriage blessed by
angels. (Variation on a
plate from an
eighteenth-century Boo,t
oJ Change )

"rii:l:l
Prime matter, consisting of body and soul. The

I
word appears in paracelsus's philosophy oi the
creation and lruitlulness of the lour elements.
Having stated holv the world is god-created
Huang Ti, rhe legendary yellow Emperor, lounder ol the
lrom the lour elements and founded on the
art of healing.
three principles of salt, sulphur and mercury,
Paracelsus describes how fossils are concealed
in rvood:

!
!'l s: : ?tn* I*:lli:ll ::"1,v1 Accordingly, the first body, the yliaster, was
A French alchemist and pupil of Canseliet and nothing but a clod rvhich contained all the
the strange circle around Fulcanelli, d,yg6 is chaos, all the waters, all minerals, all herbs,
totally devoted to laboratory and oratory all stones, all gems. Only the supreme
working in harmony, indispensably together. Master could release them and lorm them
Yochai, Sh[mon ben

\,vith tender solicitude, so that other things

could be created from the rest.
:"::-1:'"'k"b*
The heavenly chariot-ride, a mystic state,
Probably, the word is one ol Paracelsus' port-
experienced by the lewish ascetics chiefly of the
manteau words: 'hyle' (matter) + 'astrum' Geonic period, and described in the literature of
(star), the two basic compounds ol the cosmos,
the Hekaioth (the Heavenly Ha11s). The mystics,
matter representing 'below" and the stars, by prayer and fasting, would experience the
'above'. Yet of Paracelsus's variants of
'heavenly chariot-ride' through the seven
'Yliaster', 'lliadus' suggests an epic pun - the
Heavenly Halls, seeing with their own eyes ail
heroics of a journey like the Odessey, the other
therein, even in the seventh Ha1i, visions of the
great epic. See Prima also Materia.
inelfable lahveh. The ascent to the heavenly
spheres represents moral regeneration and
transformation.
"::hil :-ll*:.1 i:: !::::11 ::y:y i?l
A romantic Rabbi from Palestine, a lewish Yorede Merkabah. In Ezekiel's vision. the heavenly
'jongleur' who spent 12 years in a cave chariot is supported by four living creatures, each with
incubating the Kabbalistic Zohar, according to four laces (eagle, ox, man and lion1, lour wings, and
'straight feet' but cloven like a calf's.
Moses de Le6n, who was
writing in the thirteenth
century. Moses wished the
Zohar to have the aura of
antiquity, but is himseli a lar
more 1ike1y author of the
Zohar. Rosenroth regarded
Yochai as the author of the
Siphra di Zenioutha (Book of
Concealment), which he saw
as the oldest part of the
Zohar. Someone else who
believed in Yochai as the real
composer ol the Zohar was
Andreas Norrelius, writing
from Amsterdamin 1720.
His little pamphlet on the
Christian aspects of the
Zohar, the Phosophorus
Orthodoxae Fidei Ve terum
Cabbalistarum, has a preface
in praise of Yochai, showing
the authority of the Zohar
since its author was older
than Judah the Prince. The
Talmud is quoted to prove
that Yochai studied Kabbalah
in a cave and that he and his ,J

son wrote the Zohar there in

the 1oca1 lerusalem dialect.

182
 7?:*:'"?i?!
A restless, tragic Utopian, this friend of the
pansophist Comenius embraced the
'alternative' lifestyle of the seventeenth-century
D-"iil Hapsburgs, whether political reform, or
??:h?\:": 1! ii igl spiritual, educational or alchemical
Something of an alchemical playboy, whose transformation. Karel belonged to one of the
family poured money to bottomless perdition several powerful families that webbed the
after him, this vagabond student, born of a Bohemian secret networks stretching from The
noble family in Guienne, was educated first at Hague to Heidelberg and Prague.
home, then at Bordeaux College of Arts. His Interested in Universal Mysteries and the
tutor, an alchemist, inspired Zachaire to pursue ideal states of the Ancients, he was recipient oi
the Hermetic Art rather than his chosen Typotius's De Hieroglyphliz, a kind ol
subjects. So he started collecting folderslul of alchemico-emblem book oi the sort that
alchemical recipes, and moved with his tutor to Rudolph's team of antiquarian-cum-laureates
Toulouse. There they set up a laboratory, ful1 ol concocted for his g1ory. Karel Zerotin cut a
retorts and metals, which rapidly ran through fatalistic figure, thrice-widowered, attacked for
Zachaire's allowance. A rather sorry fate befell his unorthodox ideals and torn between friends
the tutor: death from the plague or at least of too Catholic or too Calvinistic lovalties.
from the unhealthy fumes in the rooml
Undeterred, Denis fell in with a local abb6, L::-i*
who had a recipe for achieving the Magnum 7 ?t?":?:, : l::I:::::i:l ::l :lyl
Opus. They got it underway, and alter several A major publisher of anyone who was anything
months of preparation, the hopeful abb6 told - dead, fictitious or alive in the alchemical
his monks that a1l they needed to do was melt wor1d. Being lewish, he was unlikely to be
down the big lead fountain in the cioister suspected of Christian unorthodoxy, so he
{ garden and it rvould be transformed into gold published the Rosicrucian Andreae's Chymical
the moment his experiments with Zachaire Wedding (Strasburg, 1616) and Andreae's
were complete. Christianopolis (1619), the Utopian dream
t
It seems that Denis quietly disappeared state. He published works attributed to Lull,
before his reputation was tarnished. He turned with Bruno's Commentar[es, in his huge
{ up in Paris, where other alchemists used to Theatrum Chemicum, the most ambitious
gather in the porch ol Notre-Dame to chat alchemical compendium ol his and his
L about alchemy. His picaresque encounters took children's generations.
Zachaie through an endless queue ol quacks. The first three volumes appeared in 1602,
He finally came to rest among the books of Lu11 while Volume IV was published in Strasburg
and Villanova. From then on, he took alchemy alter Zetzner had moved his business from
seriously and writes in the last pages oi his Ursel in 1613. In this, appeared Sendivogius's
autobiographi cal Treatise on the Natural Novum Lumen Chymlcum and the
Philosophy oJMetals of his plans to sell up and Voarchq.dumia in more palatable format.
to move with his new wife and his cousin to Volume Y (1622-4) was compiled
cermany and devote himself to 'The Art'. posthumously by his family, and all five
<
volumes were reprinted in 1659 and 1660.
t The corollary to this tale was added by one
Mordochaeus de Ne11e, Rudolph 11's aspiring Chorusing his way through most of these is the
assistant in the secret royal alchemical oft-quoted alchemist, Arnau de Villanova.
laboratories: Zachaire's cousin strangles him Volume VI appeared in 1661, composed by the
and runs off with his wiiel dillgent German theosophist Johann Jacob

183
 ,-==9.A
(=- --q,Ht Ztggurat

//' , -'''fuW'
!'. (;,' /l '
--il:-.>___
, r.l

Heilmann of Zweibrucken in the Palatinate, ,lu:

who, with only one assistant, translated into
Latin works filling over 770 pages. The equivalent ol a mantra in intellectual
Sufism. It is the way of repeating the name of
zissyat God (Allah) through chanting and moving the
body, often lor many hours at a time, to
Derived from the Assyrian 'ziqquratu'. A become the Perfect Man in both body and mind,
pyramidal tower in ancient Mesopotamia used on the path of spiritual alchemy as
lor astrological divination and alchemical orchestrated by the philosopher Algazel in his
transformation. Sophisticated civilizations of Proof of Islam and by A1-Suhrawardi, the
Babylonia built ziggurats using'composites': mystic alchemist put to death at Aleppo in
kiln-dried bricks set in bitumen reinforced at 1191 for the ideas he revealed in Hayakll al-

This spiral minaret at every fifth course rvith layers of fibrous reeds. nur (The Temple ol LighQ.
Samarra connects Islam The ziggurat in myth has been widely used as
with the ziggurats ol the Tower of Babel, or the hill oi the Castle ol Illustration after Ziletti's 1557 edition of the Pretiosa
Assyria and Babylonia. the Holy Grai1, or even the Palace of Prester l.[argarita Nov€lla. The crorvned king, Goid, gives
The seven ascending audience to live metalllne sen,ants (Lead, Tin, Iron,
counter-clockwise John, the prlest-king of the Sabians ol Harran.
Copper, Sihrer) and his son, Mercury.
'windings' are for the The left-fo1d path of the Moon and of Magic is
seven planets' celestial reflected in the widdershins steps or ramps up
orbits. to the top ol the ziggurat.

1:l:i::
The publisher ol an edition in 1557 of the
exquisite Pretiosa l,largarita Novella (The
Precious Nelv Pearl) that had made the
typesetter Aldus Manutius lamous in 1546.
Ziletti incorporated his device on the title-page
and reprinted Aldus' first eight leaves. Apart
from that, Ziletti's edition is exactly like the
Aldus one.
The New Pearl was compiled in 1330 by
Petrus Bonus of Pola and beautifully typeset by
Aldus 200 years later. The book is an
alchemical antholos/ lrom the rvorks of around
2O earlier alchemists - real or imaginary.
Foremost among the relerences are 70
quotations lrom the Persian Rhazes and 30
references to the supposed Geber's Summa
PeSfectlonis, and an equal number lo the Turba

184
 Zodtdc

Philosophorum, in lrrhich a company of .,vastransformed in the hands ol such a team

philosophers have an alchemical debate as Merian and de Bry into an alchemical
presided over by ry4hagoras. The New pearl is emblem-book, rvith Atalanta characters
an uncritical medley of ,authorities, luguingthrough.
including Arnau de Villanova, Ramon Lull and
Michael Scor. It puts lorward the principles of
z2aia;
alchemy, the pros and cons of the Art, the
nature of metals and the Stone. Fourteen of the Literally 'little animals' in the sky that correlate
remarkable rvoodcuts shorv the Magnum Opus with all the planers and all the kingdoms. It
in allegorical form, up ro the Crowning ol the was essenrial to consult the zodiac belore
King (gold) r,rrith his entourage ol crorvned embarking on any alchemical Operation.
Princes (the lesser metals).

Zodiac man. The parts

,:y, oi the body u,ere
thought to be gor,rerned
The word itself r,vas possibll, a paracelsan b1r the various signs ol

expletive: it was certainly a portmanreau the zodiac. Dilferent

invention: 'zinne' (tin) + ,kupfer' (copper).
diseases u,cre specitic to
the different decans.
Stomach problems, for
instance, rvere indicated

C*,zanK ! ggTuaKen !
in the flrst decanate of
Virgo. See also Decans.

€qreKa !
'\---

Paracelsus gave the name Zinc to the elemenr he

reputedly discovered because of the properties ir
appeared to share u,ith both tin and copper.

Zincgreff , f ulius Guglielmus

!::_r:i:::::h..:, :1?tl
Compiled a book ol ethico-political saylngs,
r,vhich rvere lranslormed by Matthew Merian,s
engravings into a magical wonderland,
featuring Heidelberg Casrle and the
1,oung
Palatinate couple, Frederick V and princess
Elizabeth, daughrer ollames I ol England.
Zincgreffl's Entblematum Ethico-politicorum
(1619) was published by the great Rosicruclan
sympathizer, Johann Theodor de Bry, who had
been busy publishing Fludd and Maier.
Alrhough Zincgrell's inrenrions were more
politlcally orienred tor,l ards saving the
Palatinate than Maier's, inevitablv the book

185
 Zohar

It is a dense thicket of symbolism in

?r:: Aramaic prose, but it breaks the rules of
The Magnum Opus of SpanishJewish grammar and invents words. Much of it stems
habbalah, which was compiled mostly in the lrom literary sources in the Babylonian Talmud
thirteenth century by Moses de Le6n. and the targums, so Moses was working with

The Kabbalistic symbol

of the Zohar, contained
within the alchemical
I
egg and menorah
(candlestick,
representing the divine 0
lighQ.
 zoroaster
fu<---^.
ksw ?
,N?-,,'r.,i"
''' J4c_.',\
(..,
an already established sysrem of sephiroth or
etl2j
shortly. However, on his way home, Moses
correspondences. became ill at Arevalo and died. Isaac states in
The word Zohcr means ,splendour, his diary that he repaired straight ro Avila ro
radiance, brightness, enlightenment,, and it learn the truth about the book. He was aghast
comes from the root Z-H-R, ,mystical to learn that Moses' widow had been pounced
perception'. Moses produced the main body of upon by the tax collector's wife: ,lf you give me
the Zohar although he insisted that this the ancient manuscript, you can have my son
rambling mystical commentary on the Torah for your daughter to marryl' 'But,, says the
was by Rabbi Shimon ben yochai, the cave_ widow, 'Moses wrote it out of his headl There
dwelling sage of the second century, who is no ancient manuscript!'
wandered over Galilee exchanging Kabbalistic Christian interest in the Zohar reached
insights. The Zohar relashions the Torah,s fever-pitch at the end of the fifteenth century.
narrative into a mystical novel. On one level, Pico and Reuchlin took up the study of
the biblical heroes are the protagonists, and the Kabbalah through their Jewish teachers. They
rabbis interpret their words, their personalities were convinced that it contained the original
and their encounters with holy or demonic divine revelation and accorded it parallels with
lorces. But at times the commentators become the Triniry, the Incarnation, the Virgin Mother,
the main characters: Rabbi Shimon has a the Name of Jesus and Original Sin. The
dramatic study-session, the rabbis have Franciscan Francesco Giorgi of Venice used
adventures. manuscript material from the Zohar, but it was
In the standard printed editions, the Zohar not until 1.639 that the first critical work on the
has one volume on Genesis , one volume on Zohar, Ari Nohem (&oaring Lion) by the Italian
Exodus and one on the three remaining books scholar Rabbi Leone Modena, announced that
of the Torah: Leviticus, Numbers, and the Zohar was no more than 350 years old.
Deuteronomy (although there are only a few However, the work was too highly venerated to
Zohar passages on Deuteronomy). be openly challenged; it circulated in
The Zohar circulated in manuscript portions manuscript only, and was not printed until
distributed by Moses; there is no complete 1 840.
copy. Not everyone, even then, accepted the
Zohar as an ancient work. Moses claimed that,
after Yochai's death, the book was hidden it?':yy?
away or secretly handed down lrom master to The cripple, i.e. Edward Kelley, who may well
disciple. Only recently had it been sent from have met his end escaping from Rudolph,s
Israel to Catalonia where it fell into the hands castle because he was a cripple and not
of Moses. because he 'was slayne' (as Dee asserts he was
There is a diary recorded by one Isaac ben in 1595). Cerrain it is that Sir K, knighted,
Schmuel, who escaped from Israel when Acre lamed, earless or otherwise, was hobbling
fell to the Mamluk Turks. He managed to ger ro round Most Castle at least until 22 Mav 1.597.
Spain and track down Moses de Le6n in Rudolph II.
See also
Valladolid. Isaac had heard amazing tales
about Moses' discovery of the preciou s Zohar _
Zoroaster e.628 - c. 551ac)
which had supposedly been written in Israel.
Now Isaac was from Israel, but he had never A cult hero. Pliny, writing at length on healing
heard of the Zohqr. When challenged, Moses magic, claims that it was founded in persia by
assured Isaac that he would show him the Zoroaster. Magic, says p1iny, unites the three
original manuscript at Avila, where he now arts exerting the greatest influence on human
lived, if Isaac would care to visit him there lhought: medicine, religion and divination.

187
 Zoslnos

rl

Pliny relates ho,,l, one of the librarians at matter is mined, over which pla1, the Chvmic
Alexandria, Hermippus, wrote a work entitled Choir.
About the l[Ggi and catalogued Zoroaster's In later times a lew stray books appeared in
works, amounting to two million linesl By the Zoroaster's honour: Tdlescope de Zoroastre (or
time it reached Alexandria, the cult of Key to the Grand Divinatory Cabala ol the
Zoroaster was alreadl, imbued lvith Chaldean Magi, 1796) and the Chaldean Oracles oJ
elements. Zoro(tster edited by Wynn Westcott in 1895.
Zoroaster reformed the ancient Persian
religion, Masdaism, ol its crudest leatures
(throwing little babies into the iire ol sacrilice '.:"-'*?".l'::::::l
and such like) and streamlined it into ollering Knor,vn as the Panopolite, Zosimos was a
a system of relvards for the upright life. The fourth-century Theban u,orking in Alexandria;
essence ol this became the state religion under the greatest of Gnostic alchemists. His works
the Sasanian kings ol Persia, and r,las are ful1 of extraordinary biographical detail,
preserued by the 'Magi', the powerlul moving lrom chemical praxis to visions ol the
priesthood. When the Arabs conquered gods. Zosimos is said to have lounded the chief
Damascus and the Sasanian part of Persia, Greek school of alchemy.
they Islamized the civil institurions and it is in his \,vritings thar the rvord 'alchemy'
alchemized the Zoroastrian religion. This u,as iirst appeared. It developed from the practices
amalgamated into the alchemical texts from of jer,vellers and Egvptian workmen who
Alexandria and Syria to create an oracular experimented rvith various alloys. The word
m1,stery-muddle lor the Latins ro inherit. was associated not only r,r,ith the black Nile
Zoroaster inspired the Renaissance along with mud, pr[ma mqteriq, but also r,vith the black
Hermes Trismegistus, Orpheus, Pythagoras and dust derived from certain mixtures of mercury -
other primeval priests. thought to possess marvellous properties - and
in fact, Zoroaster was venerated among the other substances. It was mystically identilied
likes oi Pico and Dee as being even more rvith the body of Osiris and considered the
ancient than the Egrptian Thoth/Hermes. Dee source of life and power.
had copies of r,yorks by 'Zoroaster', rvhile Pico Zosimos \,vas reputed to have invented an
was moved in hts Oration on the Digni1l oJ Enqyclopedia oJAlchemy in 2B Books,
l,[an to hail Zoroaster's magic as the 'science of containing some original material and much
the Divine'. Several works on Zoroaster that r'rras gleaned lrom earlier lost texts. A
appeared towards the end ol the sixteenth passion for authority led Zosimos to the
century. In 1593 Zoroaster bifurcated into wildest ascriptions ol alchemical r'vorks to
Jessenius's Zoroas ter (Wittenberg) and Hermes, Plato, Moses, A,liriam, Cleopatra and
Patricius's P h i lo s o p h ic a I t:trtgic oJ Zoroa s t e r, Isis. Legends rvere girren alchemical interpreta-
with 320 oJ his Chaldean Oracles. Both oi these tions: lason's Golden Fleece was said to be an
rival rvorks by sycophants of Rudolph II alchemical manuscript on 'parchment' and the
reflected a Zoroaster far removed lrom his Song ol Solomon an alchemicai treatise on
Persian prototype. Perhaps whar mosr appealed gold-making. Chemical facts r,r,ere introduced as
to alchemists about Zoroaster was his link with a kind ol seasoning to pure imagination.
the 'cave' imagery. Popularized Plaro had his Zosimos, lor instance, had a dream that his
cave of ideas, Bruno had his shadorvs and De head was skinned and his bones mixed with
Caus had his grottoes. Zoroaster, through the flesh and burned, and this he interpreted as the
Neoplatonic vision of Porphyry, is lnitiated in translormation ol his body into spirit. His
a cave, and so are his follorvers. The cave is an Gnostic training led him to write in antithetical
image ol the world, and it is rvhere prime riddles: 'ln speaking ol the Philosopher's Stone,

188
 Zt1/inger, Theodore

recei\rethis stone which is not a stone, a Alter much meditation on the Divine Pimander,
precious thing r,r,hich has no value, a thing ol she will attain enlightenment.
many shapes rvhich has no shapes, this
unknown rvhich is known ol all.'
Few women adepts are referred to in the ,"::n::
very male province ol alchemy, but Zosimos
Putrilied alum (via an intricate process in a
addresses a woman disciple, Theosebeia, in his
pelican) or 'sweet water, an excellent arcanum
Final Summary on the Sacerdotal Art of
for extinguishing the microscopic fire in men of
Alchem1z. He warns her against the devices ol
a metallic temperament' as Paracelsus put it.
pagan priests r,vho tvill lure her along the
'supernatural tvay' of sacrilicial offerings.
There is a right way of obtaining tinctures: the
rh:'d:::
disciple should, in a quiet and sober fashion, 7*:"y": : l:T::i:h ::Illyl
seek God u,ho is present in all things, and she A Professor of Medicine at Basel and
should make sacrifices according to the Paracelsan alchemist. According to Burton, he
recommendations ol King Solomon. She will wrore mosl pertinenr passages on antimonl'
thus obtain the authentic tone, the natural being '1ike Scanderbeg's sr,vord, rvhich is elther
tincture from pure ingredients: Attic ochre, good or bad, strong or rveak, as the party is
native sulphur, Phrygian stone, cinnabar et al. that prescribes or useth it'.
Select Bibliography
Albertus, Frater: Alchemtst's Handbook, samuel Weiser, 1987
Aristotle: Metaphysics, Animals, Ethlcs, Walter J. Black, 1943
Bacon, Francis: The Advancement oJLearning, Oxford at Clarendon,
1957

Bernal, Martin: Black Athena, Vol. I, Free Association Books, 1987

Besant, Annie: occult Chemistry, London Theosophical Publishing

House, 1919
Burton, Robert: The Anatomy oJl[elancholy, Farrar & Rinehart, 1927
Canseliet, Eugdne: L'Alchimie Expltqude sur les Textes Classtques,
Pauvert,1980
Castiglioni, Arturo: Adventures oJ the Mind, Sampson, Low, Marslon &
Co.Ltd.,1.946
Charpentier, Loui* The Wsterles oJChartres Cathedral, Thorsons, 1983

Chaucer, Geoffrey: Complete Works (ed. F.N. Robinson)' oxford

University Press, 1,97 9
Chopra, Deepak: Quantum Healing, Banam, 1989

Coliin, Rodney: The Theory oJCelestial lryfluence, Shambala, 1984

Evans, Prolessor R.J.W.: Rudo!,f II and hls World, Oxford at Clarendon,
1984

Everard, Dr John: The Divine $'mander (ed. Randolph), 1871, reprint

by Yogi from Rosicrucian Publishers' Society, 1871

Farrington, Benjamln: Greek Science, Penguin, 1966

Ficino, Marsilio: The Book oJLlfe (transl. Charles Boer), Spting
Publications, 1988
Fludd, Robert: The ortgin and Structure oJ the Cosmos (ed' Adam
Mclean), Magnum Opus Hermetic Sourceworks, 1982
Fulcanelli: Le Mystdre des Cathddralas (trans1. sworder), Brotherhood of
Lifle, 1986

Gimbel, Theo: Form, Sound, Colour and Healing, C.W. Daniel, 1987

Hope, Murrayt Practica.l Eglpt[an Mag[c, Aquarian Press, 1984

Huang Ti: Nei Ching (Yellow Emperor's Ciassic of Medicine, ed. Veith),
University of California Press, 1972

lonson, Ben: The Alchemist, New Mermaid, Benn, 1966

190
 Select Bibliography

Keller, Werner: The Bible as HistoD/, Hodder & Stoughton

, lg|T
Kelley, Edward: Alchemical Wittngs (transl. from the
Hamburg
Edition ol16T6 and ed. by Samuei Weiser),19T2
Khunrath, Heinrich: Amphithddtre de ra sagesse Eterneile,Lyon, paul
Derain,7946
Lawlor, Robert: Sacred Geometry, Thames & Hudson,
1982
L6vi, Eliphas: The Htstory o,f Magrc (transl. A.E. Waire),
Rider & Co.,
1951
McEvedy, Colin: The pengutn Atlas oJAncient Htstory, penguin,
1971
The Penguin Atlas o;f Medievat Hlstory, penguin,
- 1971
Mclean, Adam (ed.): Hermetic /ournalNo. Jg, Hermetic
Research Trust,
1987
Hermetic /ournal No. 42, Hermetic Research Trust,
- 19gg
Maier, Michael: Atalanta Fugtens (ed.
Joscelyn Godwin), Magnum Opus
Hermetic Source Works, 19g7

More, Sir Thomas: Utopla (transl. Ralph Robinson),

Cambridge
University press, 198Z
Morison, Stanley: the printer, Ernest Benn, j.925
The Art {
Paracelsus: Lebendiges Erbe (ed,.
Jolande Jacobi), Rascher yerlag, 1942
Philo olAlexandria: Works (transl. David Winston),
SpCK. 1980s
Plato: T[maeus, penguin, 19TT

Plessner, Martin: Natural Sciences and Medictne

in the Legaqt {Istam,
Oxford at Clarendon, 1974
Rabelais, FranEois: Gargantua ancl. pantagruel (transl.
Urquhart),
Everyman, Dent, 1966
Read, John: prelude to Chemistry, Heinemann, 19ST

Rudolph, K:ut: Gnos[s, T. & T. Clark Ltd,

Rumi: D[scourses (transl. A.J. Arberry), Samuel Weiser,
1972
Scholem, Gershom: Oiglns oJ the Kabbalah, princeton,
1990
Singer, charles and Dorothy: Hebran schorarship in
the Midctte Ages,
Oxford at Clarendon , 1928
sullivan, Michael: The Heritage d chrnese Art, oxford at clarendon,
1964

Urquhart, Sir Thomas: The/ewet (ed. R.D.S.

Jack and R.J. Lyall),
Scottish Academic press. 19gJ
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Versluis, Arthur: The Eg,tptian Mysteries, Arkana, 1988

Waite, Arthur Edward: The Brotherhood L the Rosy Cross, Rider & Co.
The Holy Kabbalalz, Wiiliams & Norgare Ltd, 1929
-
Paracelsus - Hermetic and Alchemical Writings (trans.), James
- Elliorr & co..1894
The Secret Tradition tn Alchemy, Kegan paul,
-
Turba Phllosophorum (ed.), William Rider & Co., tg14
-
Waite, Spence and Swainson: Three Famous Alchemists, Occult Book
Society

West, John Anthony: The Traveller's KeJ to Ancient Egtpt,Harrap

Columbus, 1989

Wood Brown, Rev. l.: fhe Llfe and Legend oJl,[ichael scof, Edinburgh,
David Douglas, 1897

Yates, Frances The Occult PhtlosophSt in the Ellzabeth Age, Ark, 1979

The Ros[crucian Enlightenment, Ark, 1972

-
Zohar: Parashat Plnhas (ed. Dr Philip Berg), Research Centre of
Kabbalah, 1987
Zohar: The Book oJEnltghtenment (transl. D. Chanan Marr), SPCK,
1 980s

Collections
Brown, Peter (ed).: The Book oJKells, Thames & Hudson, 1980
Gruppo Editoriale Fabbri: The Arcimboldo Efect, Bompiani, 1987

Harvey, Sir Paul: The Ogford Companion to ClassicalLiterature, Oxlord

at Clarendon, 1966

Keliy, [.N.D.: The O6fbrd Dictionary oJpopes, OUp, 1988

Maggs Catalogue No. 822: Early,Medicine Science, Wttchcrqft and
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Parker, Derek & Julia (eds.): The Compleat Astrologer, Mitchell Beazley,
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Private Press via Author: lilutus L[ber, private printing, 1991

Schab, William H: Monuments oJBook lllustratlon, William Schab

Ga11ery,

Stevenson, J. (ed.): A lVa,tt Eusebzas, SPCK, 1982

192
 Picture by Barbara Nicholls

Diana Fernando's interest in Alchemy started in

her childhood in the-Welsh Marches and the
WyeValley, among the menhirs and standing
stones. Study of Chaucer and Shakespeare at
school then inspired her to research the occult
background of the Renaissance. Long years
of training in esoteric study followed, when
she met twentieth-century philosophers and
practising alchemists around the world, often
visiting them in their homelands.

Taking a year offfrom teaching, she obtained

a degree in traditional typographical design
and printing.

For anyone wishing to embark on the path of

Alchemy, Diana advises humiliry diligence,
wonder and - above all - a strong sense of
humour.

Back cover image:Alchemical Cosmology, ascribed

to Norton. (Diana Fernando)

Printed in Great Britain

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