Alchemy

Alchemy is the medieval protoscience and philosophy of changing common objects into something extraordinary, rare, or endowed with supernatural powers. For example, many alchemists pursued the creation of the philosopher’s stone, a legendary substance that they believed could be used to transmute base metals into gold and silver and ingested as an elixir for immortality. Although often maligned because of such goals, alchemy was a precursor to the scientific discipline of chemistry.

Though its origins are somewhat obscure, alchemy was practiced in ancient China, India, and Greece. The work of Greek alchemists was later discovered and translated by Arabs, perhaps as early as the eighth century CE. Arab scholarship and translation reached European society in the twelfth century. Alchemy flourished during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in Europe, but the theories and practices of the alchemists were eventually overshadowed by those of the mechanical philosophers, who, led by Sir Isaac Newton, created the blueprint for the modern understanding of the physics of the natural universe.

Brief History

The Chinese were likely the first to practice alchemy, doing so in connection with medicine and ancient pharmacology. Alchemy was most closely associated with Taoism, and approximately one hundred Taoist texts include references to alchemy. Unlike the later Western alchemists, Chinese practitioners were primarily interested in creating an elixir for immortality, combining materials such as mercury, arsenic, and sulfur.

The Tan chin yao chüeh (“great secrets of alchemy”), the best known Chinese text on alchemy and dating to the sixth or seventh century CE, offers recipes for creating concoctions for immortality; however, alchemy was likely practiced in China as early as the fifth century BCE, during the Warring States period. In fact, alchemy has been linked to the deaths of several emperors, who might have died after ingesting alchemical elixirs designed to engender immortality.

Chinese alchemy eventually faded from fashion, but the Western world has a long history of its study, beginning in ancient Greece. Often considered the first Western alchemist, Zosimos of Panopolis, born circa 300 CE, was also a mystic who considered the manipulation of metals and chemicals as both physical and spiritual processes. Thus, though alchemy was in many ways a material art, it has deep roots in the supernatural. Zosimos discusses the theoretical purposes of alchemy—which include the death of base metals and their rebirth into something nobler—and he touches on the idea that an element exists that can cause an instantaneous transmutation of base metals. This substance, or the idea behind it, is similar to the concept of the philosopher’s stone, which would become a preoccupation of alchemists during the Middle Ages and early Renaissance.

Overview

Arabic alchemy can be considered a bridge between ancient alchemical practices and those practiced in Europe in the Middle Ages. However, the origins of Arabic alchemy are somewhat mysterious, and its connection to Hellenistic alchemy is tenuous. Nonetheless, the work of Arabic scholars and alchemists was undeniably influential on later European practitioners.

Considered by many to be the greatest Arabic alchemist, Muhammad ibn Zakariyā al-Rāzī reputedly believed in the ability to transmute lesser metals into gold, but he also documented several chemical principles and processes. For example, he developed distillation procedures, documented the chemical processes of mercury, and used the mineral sal ammoniac. The Arabic emphasis on medicinal minerals over herbs stems from Rāzī’s work, which became a major influence on European conceptions of chemistry and alchemy.

European alchemy has its roots in its Arabic predecessors; the first Latin translation of an Arabic alchemical work dates to the mid-twelfth century. Philosopher and bishop Albertus Magnus, writing in the early thirteenth century, references the sulfur-mercury theory in alchemy that all metals are made of sophic sulfur and sophic mercury. The alchemy of this era can be seen as the precursor to chemistry, as scholars concerned themselves with chemical processes, the construction and implementation of laboratory equipment, and the pragmatic application of chemical theories.

However, the mystical applications of alchemy never faded, and the chemical discoveries of the thirteenth and early fourteen centuries were soon married with the experimentation of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The alchemists’ pursuit of transmutation caused both Pope John XXII and England’s king Henry IV to issue statutes against the pursuit of gold making. Despite some unsavory intentions, alchemy, and especially its methods such as distillation and condensation, led to advances in medicine and lent an element of legitimacy that enabled the art to survive into the Renaissance.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Europe, alchemy as a medical application became widespread. The movement was best embodied by Paracelsus, who is widely considered the father of biochemistry. He believed that, to be effective, medical science should rely on four ideas or disciplines: virtue, natural philosophy, astronomy, and alchemy. Paracelsus and his followers relied on the Bible and empirical observations of nature to guide their philosophical abstractions, ever asserting that the biblical story of creation is one of alchemy. The school also presented principles for the alchemical importance of sulfur, mercury, and salt.

Paracelsus’s view of the universe differed sharply from the view held by the mechanical philosophers, and by the mid-seventeenth century, it had fallen out of favor, specifically because of the tangible physics work of Newton and others. However, few doubt the influence that the work of European alchemists had on the scientific revolution, and alchemy is widely regarded as the precursor to modern chemistry. Nonetheless, a modern view of the history of alchemy often concentrates on the occult nature of the philosopher’s stone and the quests to manufacture gold and to invoke immortality. As modern scholars have pointed out, these quests may be best understood from psychological, religious, or philosophical vantage points rather than a scientific one.

Bibliography

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Fernando, Diana. The Dictionary of Alchemy: An A-Z of History, People and Definitions. London: Vega, 2002. Print.

Fleming, John V. The Dark Side of the Enlightenment: Wizards, Alchemists, and Spiritual Seekers in the Age of Reason. New York: Norton, 2013. Print.

Hauck, Dennis William. Sorcerer’s Stone: A Beginner’s Guide to Alchemy. Secaucus: Citadel P, 2004. Print.

Linden, Stanton J. The Alchemy Reader: From Hermes Trismegistus to Isaac Newton. New York: Cambridge UP, 2003. Print.

Principe, Lawrence. “A Fresh Look at Alchemy: Alchemists Are Being Reappraised after Being Dismissed for Centuries.” Chemistry World 10.7 (2013): 50–53. Print.

Stratford, Jordan. A Dictionary of Western Alchemy. Wheaton: Quest, 2011. Print.