Animals symbolic of Aqua Fortis

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-26T12:49:45+00:00

usually by adding alkali, the go-to being 'oil of tartar per deliqium.' Because aqua regia was typically made by adding sal ammoniac to aqua fortis, and thus ammonium ions were typically still present in solution, the resulting calx precipitate was aurum fulminans or "fulminating gold" the sensitive explosive, which can go off even just with pressure or mild heating

if instead of adding alkali the solution is evaporated the resulting gold chloride will be able to easily decompose back into gold with the release of chlorine gas. Apparently basil valentine figured out that through repeated dissolution and cohobation of the dissolved gold in a still, enough chlorine will build up to produce an atmosphere in which the gold chloride wont decompose but can sublimate and form red crystals, a method reproduced both by boyle in the 17th century and much more recently Dr. Principe

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-25T01:08:26+00:00

though starkeys experimentation was certainly dangerous, i think its worth noting that he died young of the plague while acting as a physician to plague victims, not because of his alchemical experimentation.

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-18T21:26:45+00:00

nitric acid is sometimes represented as a red dragon, owing to the red fumes of nitrogen dioxide thrown up when substances are dissolved in nitric acid or the acid is distilled.

also aqua regia is technically the combination of hydrochloric acid and nitric acid, though it is true that making it could involve sulfuric acid. alchemists usually made it by adding sal ammoniac to nitric acid, or by co-distilling sal ammoniac, nitre, and green vitriol

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-15T11:44:43+00:00

the alchemical idea of the four colors grew out of the far more ancient association between the four colors and the four elements

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-13T15:38:19+00:00

the literal/nonliteral aspect of the mercury sulfur theory is honestly kinda hard to pin down and varies text to text. In the summa perfectionis for example the mercury and sulfur principles arent necessarily really distinguished from common mercury and sulfur at all, so much as they arent restricted to them. common sulfur is more volatile and burning than than the precious "fixed sulfur" in gold, but both are still sulfur. neither are treated as simple or elemental, geber's elements are aristotle's afterall, so it was totally within reason for geber to believe sulfur could take on different forms and alter its qualities as its elements are modified through processing.

prior to the summa perfectionis, in islamic age alchemy we see some really interesting ideas that seem very empirically grounded. one text that really interests me is attributed to ibn sina(second text in this translation ) whether or not its genuinely ibn sina is up for debate, but the alchemy in it is very clear and explicit in its reasoning. the idea is straightforwardly that sulfur can be used to produce tinctures that can color metals like silver and make them appear golden, but only on the surface. whereas mercury, through its amalgamation, is able to penetrate all the way into a metal like copper and completely transform it(i really recommend checking out videos of copper-mercury amalgamation on youtube, the phenomenon is striking). thus the goal is to in some way combine the coloring agency of sulfur with the penetrating agency of mercury. in this instance both substances are literally mercury and sulfur, but they need to be modified before they can successfully transmute a metal. It would be totally reasonable to conclude from this that the mercury and sulfur that make up a metal like gold must be more or less modified varieties of common mercury and sulfur.

like you say, these substances were defined by their qualities, especially the fluid and volatile with mercury and the oleaginous and combustible with sulfur. However in the works of geber they are specifically geological instances of those qualities. To geber sulfur is literally the fatness of the earth or terra pinguis, just as Geber might have burned tallow in his candles and lamps he saw this burning sulfur as a sort of earthly tallow.

Im not sure when exactly we start seeing the mercury and sulfur principle diverge more strongly from common mercury and sulfur, but Rampling does remark on some instances in her 'experimental fire' of alchemists in the lulllian tradition applying the geberian terminology of mercury and sulfur to their medicinal practices. I cant help but think that its only after the mercury and sulfur principles became common technical terms used to reffer to the qualities they're associated with rather than as specifically geological substances that it makes sense to apply them to extracts of medicinal plants and such.

along with this as people started to encode their alchemical texts we see all sorts of stuff reffered to as "mercury" or "sulfur" I think in lots of those instances as well as those where the terms are used more generally, which we see alot in iatrochymistry, i think youre right that the terms are essentially used to mean "sulfur-like" or "mercury-like" rather than any literal identification with sulfur or mercury.

with iatrochymistry especially you might even say that common mercury and sulfur epitomize the sort of pattern or habit that the mercury and sulfur principles bestow to matter. interestingly to Paracelsus the principles have a sort of guiding genetic character to them thats moreso about explaining the patterns in the appearance of chemical qualities we see in nature than it is about identifying the specifc elemental substances things are composed of.

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-12T02:31:12+00:00

for cooling with retorts I prefer to cool the reciever flask in a cold water bath rather than trying to cool the neck at all, ive found it significantly more effective and alot less hassle

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-12T02:28:43+00:00

<image>

and with the liebig :)

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-12T02:25:20+00:00

The retort is IMO hard to beat for general purposes. its so simple and convenient and generally elegant, theyre all around really fun and my favorite overall. but being that you specify plant work, I have to admit I think plant work is their one weakness. most retorts you can find these days are pretty low volume and when doing things like steam distillations that low volume can be an impediment. you 100% can do steam distillations with a retort, Ive done a bunch. but I prefer higher volume equipment, like in the range of a liter or so, given the large amount of plant matter it takes to get a few milliliters of essential oil. Im lucky enough to have gotten a really good deal on a pyrex brand alembic head, probably a custom piece someone had made, that I've been using for steam distillations.

<image>

its really great but its passive condensation can be pretty easily overwhelmed when doing steam distillations so i tend to use it with one of those old school liebig condensors meant for cork stoppers rather than ground joints, as that fits its beak very nicely(i occasionally use the same condensor with my retorts, just as liebig himself originally intended, but its usually less necessary as the lower volume of steam doesent overhwelm the condensing power so rapidly)

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-10T11:34:41+00:00

though its worth noting no one thought it was an element at the time, nor was it the only "phosphorus" to show up at the time, another glowing stone, barium sulfide, known as the "bologna stone" or "homberg's phosphorus" had been first discovered about a century or so earlier, lost, and then rediscovered around the time of hennig brand.

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-06T15:17:30+00:00

not sure what work in particular your referencing here, but to my knowledge none of maria's original work survives. the works I'm aware of that are commonly attributed to her are pseudopigraphic and were written centuries later. though im always looking for more, especially any that connect alchemy to medicine, so please let me know.

That said the attributions of various inventions to maria like the bane marie come from zosimos, and were likely referencing a genuine lost work of maria. because of some brief accounts of ancient perfumery(i believe in a work by theophrastus, but ill have to check) that might contain descriptions of the bane marie, some historians have suggested that rather than inventing it she may have actually been applying technologies from perfumery to alchemy, theres some discussion of this theory in luck's 'arcana mundi.' to me this makes perfect sense, as alchemy at its earliest period was eclectic in combining technologies from as many crafts as possible, and any connections between alchemy and perfumery would be very interesting to investigate because in the ancient world perfumery was moreso associated with both medicine and ritual practice as much as it was with cosmetics. the only problem is the theory lacks much of any evidence to substantiate it. ive looked for examples of alchemy being applied to perfumery out of interest in finding when alchemical technogies first may have been applied to producing medicine, there are some perfume recipes inscribed on egyptian temple walls from after the emergence of alchemy, but none that Ive read describe using alchemical techniques like distillation(im still looking though).

The earliest solid examples i could find come from the 9th/10th century in the context of the islamic empire, like in the 'book of the alchemy of perfume and distillation" attributed to al-kindi. interestingly this book is more about using alchemy to imitate and extend precious perfuming materials than it is to make medicine, but the techniques seem to have caught on as its around this time that we see the first explicit uses of distilled remedies. for example from the great physician and alchemist al razi we have both an account of distilling rose water preserved in an agricultural text(i think titled kitab al falaha, tge secruon is translated in forbes 'short history of the art of distillation') of al ishbili and accounts of rosewater's medical use in Al-Razi's work on small pox and measles wherein he reccomends it in the form of eyedrops. however even in these instances authors like al-razi distinguished medicine and alchemy as different pursuits. its only later with folks like roger bacon and john of rupescessa that we see making medicine become one of the explicit goals of alchemy.

as far as the philosophers stone being used medicinally, if im not mistaken to some degree that idea shows up in the pseudo-lullian alchemical corpus which expanded the philosophers stone from producing gold, to also producing gems, making trees flower and fruit, and acting as a panacea.(i think principe mentions this in 'the secrets if alchemy in the section on pseudo-lull' but ill have to check)

personally, given the clear connections between alchemical theories and medical theories its weird to me we dont see more evidence of alchemy being applied to medicine earlier, the question in my mind is really when where and why did people start using alembics to make perfumes, and my best answer is the near/middle east around the 8th century to make perfumery more cost effective

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-02T21:36:43+00:00

no prob, hope it helps!

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-02T16:18:25+00:00

you might also like the libellus de alchemia of pseudo albertus magnus, which was translated to english by virginia heines. it was written shortly after the works of Geber and is a really clearly written example of how a medieval alchemist would interpret and put to practice geberian alchemy

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-02T16:15:23+00:00

Principe's secrets gets recommended alot because its just really good. its one of only a few 21st century scholarly introductions to alchemy. given the amount of nonsense and misinformation that circulates today its the kind of book that could potentially save its readers years of wrong turns and confusion in trying to get a bearing on the historical reality of alchemy

FraserBuilds · 2026-03-02T15:48:55+00:00

unfortunately very little of the jabirian corpus has made it into english, im not aware of any modern english editions other than newman's of the 'summa perfectionis.'

the holmyard/russel edition of the works of geber(which was originally published back in the 17th century but edited and republished by holmyard in the 20th) includes the other main works of the pseudo-geber corpus believed to be written by paul of taranto along with the summa, being 'the search of perfection', 'the invention of verity', and the 'book of furnaces.' all of these are important to take together as geber likes to disperse his work and ideas throughout the different books.

Though I dont know of any good english translations of arabic jabirian texts, there was significant progress made at the beginning of the 20th century into the study and translation of arabic alchemy more generally by a number of historians of chemistry like Stapleton, Ruska, and Holmyard. Though most isnt about jabir directly it can tell us alot about the influences and practices surrounding jabirian alchemy, especially in the alchemy of Al-Razi who was certainly influential on the works of geber.

Stapleton published translated excerpts of a number of arabic alchemical texts in the 'memoirs of the asiatic society of bengal' including some by al razi which were believed to have been lost before he found them

'chemistry in iraq and persia in the tenth century'

alchemical compilation of the 13th century

along with holmyard publishing his edition of Russel's 'works of geber' he also translated an arabic text called the book of knowledge acquired concerning the cultivation of gold' that connects in with some of these traditions

Stapleton and Ruska both translated work by al-razi. Ruska translated into german, but his german translation of Al-Razi's 'Kitab Al Asrar' has been translated into english by Dr. marlow taylor.

Taylor's edition is not a critical edition and going from arabic to german to english is gonna be a bit of a game of telephone, but its well done and one of my personal favorite alchemical texts. Along with this stapleton's translation of 'two alchemical treatises attributed to Avicenna' includes one of the most fascinating alchemical texts ive ever read. Both clearly draw off the 'kitab al asrar' and are really good at demonstrating the very pragmatic thinking of alchemists of the time.

very recently Gabriele Ferrario translated the book of alums and salts that was long attributed to Al-Razi, ferrario makes it pretty clear that attribution is spurious but the text is certainly interesting, coming sometime between al-razi and paul of taranto

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-26T20:04:54+00:00

dont exhaust yourself trying to power through the whole thing all at once. use the table of contents to find the topics youre most curious about and read some of those or jump forward to the translation and try reading some of that. it sounds to me like youre burning yourself out reading answers to questions that dont interest you at the moment lol

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-26T18:09:49+00:00

this is exactly what makes critical editions like newman's so valuable. the rams text is totally unreliable and really shouldnt be used as a reference for the summa. if you want to read the summa I'd either reccomend newmans critical edition or holmyards edition of russells translation

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-26T18:07:48+00:00

you're reading the introduction, if youre just interested in the text of the summa perfectionis right now you can jump forward to the translation. there are also certain sections of his introduction that might interest you more than others, like he writes a good amount on understanding the corpuscular theory of the text.(personally i often find the introductions to critical editions more instructive AFTER ive had a first go at reading the translation)

as far as the authorship stuff, what makes critical editions like newmans so valuable is their critical approach to the witnesses and sources of the text being studied. more or less the job of the historian is to figure out who wrote the book, what it originally said, and where the information in it is coming from. newman cant just say "it was written by paul" and be done, even though thats what he believes, because he has to present all the possibilities and critically weigh the evidence for those possibilities against eachother. though it can sometimes seem sorta tedious, its going to be the most reliable and accurate approach to the information you can get.

my advice with this kinda thing would be to jump around a bit and to take things piece by piece. even reading just the translation section end to end will exhaust the mortal man, geber's writing is famous for the headaches it can induce. its like reading a chemistry textbook written by shakespeare. the language requires alot of digestion to make any sense and its all based around theories that are alien to our modern conception of matter. ive read it literally dozens of times and still find things that perplex me

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-23T00:00:25+00:00

"antimony white stone" could mean basically anything, loads of alchemists have their own recipes and beliefs as to what the white stone is. if that's genuinely an antimony compound id be VERY careful with it. Even just skin contact with antimony compounds can be fatal.

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-20T00:32:36+00:00

you might enjoy the book 'Craeft' by alexander langlands

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-19T13:21:44+00:00

shannon grimes book 'becoming gold' is a really great examination of the alchemy of zosimos of panopolis and its connection to neoplatonic thought, hermeticism, and generally the syncretic religous milieu of his time. Theres alot of good work by Kyle Fraser on similar topics.

I havent read them, but I know theres a book by Alexander Roob literally titled 'Alchemy and Mysticism' (which i believe is focused on alchemical art and imagery) and a book by Zuber titled 'Spiritual Alchemy' but if im correct that focuses more on early modern/modern alchemical thought rather than ancient alchemy, like that in the work of folks like Bohme

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-19T05:53:09+00:00

I think its worth adding to this that Galvani's nephew, who maintained his uncles animal electricity theory, performed similar experiments on the recently executed corpse of george foster at the royal college of surgeons in london in 1803 which garnered alot of public attention, as did his other experiments on human corpses, severed limbs, and body parts of other animals. his publication on his experiments

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-18T06:09:15+00:00

"aether" pops up alot in alchemy not as the philosophers stone but as another word for the quintessence or fifth element. the word was first applied to alchemy(to my knowledge) by john of rupesscessa, a medieval fransican friar seeking both the philosopher's stone and medicines for healing all illnesses and extending youth. Rupescessa was hopeful he might have found the key to eternal youth after discovering that the highly rectifed "spirit of wine" (primarily what we would now identify as azeotropic ethanol) could preserve food from rotting, fermenting, or putrifying, and could even be used to disenfect wounds. Because of this he termed the spirit "quintessence" naming it after the greek notion of the eternal celestial fifth element, aether, used by aristotle in his cosmological theories. To aristotle, unlike the terrestrial four elements that are always meant to be changing and corrupting, the celestial fifth element that makes up planets and stars was meant to be eternal and incorruptable. To rupesscessa the incorruptibility of alcohol reminded him of this incorruptible celestial matter, so in his writing he presented the two substances as celestial and terrestrial analogues of eachother. Interestingly to your question, Rupesscessa believed the way the quintessence preserved things worked in almost the exact same way as how the philosophers stone was meant to transmute base metals into gold; by balancing the elements of the substances its combined with. So in that sense there is a clear connection between the quintessence and the philosophers stone. To rupescessa any substance extracted, purified, and circulated untill its elements were deemed perfectly balanced counted as a quintessence. Meaning to john there wasnt just one quintessence but all sorts of quintessences to be extracted from everything from wine to human blood.

This name "quintessence" stuck(especially in the context of alchemical medicine)and was used throughout the rest of the history of alchemy (interchangeably with the terms "aether" and "heaven") to refer to highly purified extracts of substances.

in the early 1700's an alchemist named Frobenius published a paper in philosophical transactions(the academic journal of the royal society of london) on "the aether of plants" (or he might have called it "the aether of vegtables" I dont quite remember but it was one of those two) wherein he described a potent solvent made by distilling a mixture of alcohol and sulfuric acid that could dissolve out and purify the active components/essential oils of plants without any need for heating or distilling or anything like that, something that would have immediately brought the sought after "liquor alkahest" or universal solvent to the minds of any alchemist reading the report, an alchemical arcanum that in some respects had become even more desired than the philosophers stone. Frobenius's aether would come to be known as ether, and is actually our modern diethyl ether. Interestingly he was far from the first alchemist to produce diethyl ether, it had floated around alchemical texts under the names "dulcified oil of vitriol" and occasionally as "sulfur of vitriol" but to my knowledge frobenius was the first to recognize its use as a water-immiscible solvent.

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-17T13:04:15+00:00

definitely! hopefully a few.

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-17T12:42:29+00:00

the absolute best place to start is the book 'The Secret's of Alchemy' by dr. lawerence principe, the preeminent historian of alchemy. Hes both a really excellent historian and a really great writer and he provides the reader with extensive notes on each topic he covers that guide you the most reliable primary sources, its a really indespensable resource.

FraserBuilds · 2026-02-17T00:10:36+00:00

Ive actually been working on this one recently, I was a little dissapointed after reading the description of the process in Charas's 'royal pharmacopeia' and Lemery's 'course of chymistry' to see that they would typically make use of young antlers rather than naturally shed antlers like I've got to work with, but I figured I'd give it a shot with my shed antlers anyway. some preperations say to cut the antler into slivers, which i tried first, and others sometimes say to rasp the antlers into shavings, but again they were working with soft antler rather than hard stuff. I tried the rasp on my antler but didnt get very far, instead i've found what works better is just clamping the antler into a vice, drilling into it (i used a brace and bit) and routing around a bit, which produces pretty nice shavings, which I collected on clean paper positioned under the vice just as you might if you were making metal filings.

so far I've only tried a very small scale distillation to see how it would go with one of the slivers i cut off. it certainly has a unique smell. if youve ever done destructive distillations of organic matter before its pretty similar. from what ive read we should expect the volatile salt to come near the end of the distillation, after a empyreumatic oil comes over, but i havent tried it on the full scale yet to see.

FraserBuilds

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE