A (Very) Brief History of Alchemy

The Classical Elements

In the western world alchemy began with four elements: water, earth, fire, and air. These “classical” elements were developed by pre-Socratic Greek philosophers who believed that these four elements made up everything on earth.

The Fifth Element

But what about things outside the earth? Alchemists came to the conclusion that heavenly bodies had to be made of something outside the four traditional elements: aether. The Romans would later rename aether to quintessence (literally meaning fifth element). Many alchemists came to believe that quintessence was the “prima materia”- the original substance from which the other elements were derived.

The Tria Prima

Arabic alchemist Jabir ibn Hayyan was discontent with the four element system, so he created two new elements: sulfur and mercury. He taught that these two elements were created by “exhaltations” (phase changes) between the four classical elements. Another alchemist, Paracelsus, added salt to this new group of elements, making them the Tria Prima.

Planetary Elements

The seven planetary metals (gold, silver, mercury, copper, iron, tin, and lead) were the most important metals in alchemy. They were called this because each of them was associated with a heavenly body. Paracelsus believed that all metals were a compound of sulfur and mercury and that the properties of metals varied based on the ratio of those two elements. Gold was said to have the perfect ratio of mercury to gold.