Known as the father of alchemy, he also believed that fallen angels taught metallurgy the study of metal properties and their production and purification to women they married. According to Zosimos, who wrote of her and her discoveries, Maria the Hebrew, or Maria Hebraea, lived between the first and third centuries AD. She also saw metals and other objects as male or female, and thought that metals, like living things, could die.
However, she believed death was only a change in form and not final, just like plants change into ash when they burn. It is a double-vessel airtight container with a sheet of copper upon its upper side that heats substances without scorching them. All three are still used today for chemical experiments. With his work on the effect of chemicals on the human body, his discovery of carbon dioxide, and his belief that understanding the body and the world needed to begin with alchemy, Belgian scientist Van Helmont helped synonymise alchemy and chemistry.
He reckoned that nothing could advance without alchemy. Also, his theory was that gold created by alchemy would never decay or die, and consuming the manmade gold would have the same effect on the body. During his gold-finding experiments, he inadvertently created the basis for gunpowder by combining sulphur and saltpetre. He spent 30 years collating and translating everything he could, pulling out all the stops to uncover the formula for the supreme object of alchemy.
Like transmuting base metals into gold with alchemic processes, sick organs in the body could be made healthy with the help of chemicals.
On the plus side, Paracelsus was credited with discovering laudanum, or tincture of opium. This prompted a summons to the court of Augustus II the Strong, Elector of Saxony, who ordered him to make this claim a reality, as he loved gold but was always short of money. German alchemist Brand, like his 17th century peers, saw human urine as more than just waste and he discovered something truly precious in pee — phosphorus. He collected around 5, litres of urine during his experiments and he apparently preferred getting it from people who drank beer due to the distinct colouration.
It is believed that he boiled and extracted the components of the urine in different ways. Upon final distillation, the product left behind was white, smelly and glowed in the dark. Another theory of his was a corpuscular theory according to which all matter consists of atoms.
The properties of the single matters depends from the density of the atoms - a very progressive view regarding the time when it was formulated. He perhaps did not know how close he was to truth. His main work was the Liber Secretorum 17 in which he laid down his theories and methods. Towards the end of his life he re-edited it and published an abridged version under the title Secretum Secretorum.
Like his colleague Rhazes he actually was a physician of high reputation. He studies the works of his predecessors and comes to believe that a real transmutation of metals is plainly impossible. Alchemy and the alchemists only can copy and imitate nature. He occupies himself with the elixir only for medical purposes. The search for gold has been abandoned for the sake of longevity. His main work Canon Medicinae in the 12th century translated by Gerhard of Cremona is one of the fundamental works of mediaeval medicine.
A large number of pseudepigraphs was published under his name. During the 11th and 12th century Christian scholars became increasingly interested in science and philosophy of the Greek and Arab and thus became aware of alchemy as well. Cities like Paris, Salerno and Toledo became centres of education and science. Many philosophical and alchemical were translated into Latin, first of all in Spain and Sicily, then still occupied by the Arab.
These works were regarded as the wisdom of 'the Old' and avidly studied, however some scholars, among them Adelard of Bath , stood up against the blind and un-reflected reception of the works. After their opinion one certainly should read these works but should not see in them the ultima ratio but rather a basis for own research. His contemporary Hortulanus wrote a compendium and a dictionary of alchemy and published a commentary of the tabula smaragdina.
Alanus ab Insulis again wrote against the lack of scholarly self-consciousness he encountered among his contemporaries. He was abbot of Clairvaux and a very learned man. Because of his almost biblical age his contemporaries believed that he must have found the elixir. The books that by that time were read most were Djabir's Liber divinitatis de LXX , pseudo-Rhazes Liber lumen luminum and De aluminibus et salibus, a mixture of exoteric- scientific parts and esoteric - mystical allegories.
One of the greatest scholars of the middle Ages, Albertus Magnus , dedicated much of his life and work to alchemy. He, despite the works of Avicenna which he should have read, believed in the possibility of the transmutation and accordingly took effort in research. The essence of his theories and ideas he wrote down in his important works De Alchymia, De rebus metallicis et mineralibus, and Octo capita de philosophorum lapide.
His contemporary Roger Bacon , like Albertus Magnus a very learned man 18 , had studied and taught at the important universities of his time. Bacon enjoyed a high reputation for trying out all experiments he read about. His concern for alchemy, however, caused him, he was member of the Franciscan order, several problems because about that time beginning in Spain alchemy became banned as un-Christian and pagan.
In his main works Speculum Alchimiae , Opus tertium and his other writings he turned against the rising influence of occultism and magic He pleaded for alchemy as a serious science and a basis of philosophy of nature, and its practical side has nothing to do with mysticism and occult practices.
Notwithstanding the opposition of the clergy, alchemy became very popular during the 13th and 14th century. For the first time alchemy was included into encyclopaedias, e.
De proprietatibus rerum by Bartholomaeus Anglicus end of 12th century , Liber de natura rerum by Thomas Cantimpratensis , and Speculum maior by Vincenz of Beauvais, and lots of books with sometimes very obscure recipes were circulating. Allegedly alchemy also found its way into art and literature. According to Haage the Grail in Wolfram of Eschenbach's 'Parzival' is an allegory of the lapis philosophorum. This sounds intelligible because one of the properties both shared by the Grail and the philosophers' stone is to cure all diseases.
The making and multiplying of gold and silver, like in the Hellenistic days, must have been very popular and profitable. At the end of this chapter the attention should be drawn to the work of Geber latinus end of 13th-beginning of 14th century.
It is not completely proved yet, whether he really lived or not, however in his corpus there are some ideas that cannot have been those of Djabir Ibn Hajjan, alias Geber arabicus. His view of alchemy is that of an applied natural science and he is in favour of experiments rather than mere theory. As sources for his Summa prfectionis magisterii the following works can be identified: Rhazes Liber Secretorum de voce Bubacaris, Geber arabicus Liber divinitatis de LXX, pseudo-Rhazes De aluminibus et salibus, pseudo-Aristotle De perfecta magisteria, Avicenna De congelatione et conglutinatione lapidum, pseudo-Avicenna De re recta, and Albertus Magnus De mineralibus.
From these books and apparently after own studies Geber developed a new corpuscular theory and a new transmutation theory.
To him all substances consist of corpuscles of different size which make them impure. Only if the alchemist is able to bring the substances into the state of mediocris substantia , i.
His recipe for a transmutation is as follows: 1. As can be seen, the Sal is missing, to me a fact that clearly distinguishes him from Geber arabicus. Of his predecessors he picked up the idea that Mercury is a basic component of all metals and extended it to his theory of the lapis philosophorum being pure Mercury in mediocris substantia.
Like in all epochs before also in the Middle Ages of course there circulated pseudepigraphs in abundance. Again the names of the Greek philosophers, Hermes Trismegistos, but also of contemporary scholars like Arnaldus of Villanova and Raimundus Lullus, who somewhere in their lives occupied themselves with alchemy but never published own alchemical works, were to be found under sometimes obscure books of yet more obscure recipes.
Let us now leave the West and direct our attention to the cultures of the Far East. Here in China and India also and alchemistic art developed but due to some cultural and historical peculiarities unfortunately the research so far did not quite succeed to detect the real origins of Eastern alchemy.
The roots of Chinese alchemy go far back into time, although most preserved written evidences are from the first few centuries AD. It can be held that they are compilations of much older works. An especially tragic date for the historians of China was the year BC when emperor Shi-Huang-Ti ordered the burning of all books he could get, except those about farming, medicine, pharmacy, tree cultivation, and fortune-telling.
Fortunately soon after him in the Han-period BC AD there was much effort to replace the loss but lots of gaps evidently were carelessly filled with conjectures. Surely at these times forgery was booming. The most striking difference to Western alchemy is that the Chinese give little or no importance to the making and multiplying of gold.
The main goal of Chinese alchemy is the elixir of immortality. An argument for the old age Chinese alchemy is the belief in immortality which can be traced back to the 8th century BC, as early as in the 4th century BC it was believed that it is possible to attain immortality, and finally in the 1st century BC the corresponding drug was first mentioned in a treatise as 'drinkable gold' The Chinese philosophy already in ancient times developed the cosmic principle of Yin and Yang, represented by the symbol [.
Either bears the seed of the other and neither could be without the other. Another philosophical root of Chinese alchemy is Taoism. This philosophical-religious movement was founded in the 6th century BC by Lao- Tse and its main work is the Tao-Te-King 'classic way of power'. From the beginning on the Taoists were outsiders and soon the movement split up into a purist and mystic fraction. The latter were said to possess super- natural powers and consequently the evolving alchemy was grafted onto them.
It is a practical treatise on creating elixirs for attaining immortality, using organic and mineral ingredients Mercury, Sulphur, salts of Mercury and arsenic are mentioned , and several recipes for the cure of diseases.
Because some ingredients are highly poisonous it is no surprise that several monarchs died of elixir poisoning. Both alchemists and emperors became more cautious after a whole series of such royal deaths. In the centuries to come the Chinese presumably lost interest in alchemy because alchemical texts became more and more scarce and finally ceased completely.
In India and Tibet there existed a kind of alchemy that strictly speaking was no alchemy in the true sense of the word but more or less pharmacy and, to apply the Paracelsian term, iatrochemistry. Lippmann reproaches especially Indian authors for a lack of chronological thinking. He criticises that newer findings simply were included into new editions of older works.
Transmutation of metals into gold plays only a very marginal role in the older texts of that region. Immortality neither was a main objective of the Indians and Tibetans because their religions already offer a way to it.
Jump to main content. Periodic Table. What is alchemy? The art of alchemy was handed down through the centuries from Egypt and Arabia to Greece and Rome, and finally to western and central Europe. Was this the legendary elixir that would turn lead into gold? Alas, it was not. Brandt had stumbled on the element phosphorus. It was in just this way that many of the elements were discovered by alchemists and later investigators. Working with the substances of nature, they set out to make something useful or valuable The Secrets of Alchemy.
The Origins of Chemistry Tucked away in a vault in a Dutch museum is the earliest known document about the science of chemistry — an ancient scroll called the Leyden Papyrus. The Birth and Spread of Alchemy But around the time the Leyden papyrus was written, an important change took place. Turning One Element into Another The long and fruitless quest to turn lead into gold seems silly to many people today — a colossal waste of time and effort.
Phosphorus: An Accidental Discovery One night in , a German alchemist named Hennig Brandt was searching, as he did every night, for a way to make gold. Sound Bite: Prized for its Beauty — While gold is too soft to have many uses, Principe notes, it has captured the human imagination for centuries.
Sound Bite: Where Alchemy Begins — What began as an effort to make metals that could pass for gold turned into an effort to make real gold.
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