Knowledge Commons | Alchemy | Activity https://hcommons.org/groups/alchemy/ Activity feed for the group, Alchemy. Sat, 04 Apr 2026 17:40:41 -0400 https://buddypress.org/?v=10.6.0 en-US 30 hourly 2 923c08b69a03b31393ff97fb02367667 Decus Omne deposited Elixires arabolatinos. Ad Hasen in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1896630/ Sun, 18 Aug 2024 03:00:06 -0400 Audiant secreti es el proyecto de una colección que quiere presentar textos semiacadémicos de los hitos más importantes en la teoría y práctica de los elixires transmutatorios de diferentes épocas o tendencias. El presente trabajo, el primero de la serie, presenta la edición, con notas explicativas y traducción al español, de la Epistola ad Hasen…[Read more]

]]> 0 d3fd02fd2d13370238516d1687ff58d5 Lloyd Graham deposited Rainbow serpents, dragons and dragon-slayers: Global traits, ancient Egyptian particulars, and alchemical echoes in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1895885/ Sat, 10 Aug 2024 03:00:29 -0400 Robert Blust has recently established that – globally – dragons evolved from rainbow serpents, which in turn represent a prehistoric understanding of rainbows. The present paper explores the “dragon-scape” of ancient Egypt in search of traits that may have survived from these earlier stages. The cryptic pD.tyw Sw and Iaau of Coffin Text 698 mig…[Read more]

]]> 0 fc905bb079ddc20a9dad3fff8756d01c Alexandre Roberts posted an update in the group Alchemy: ...and a prequel to that […] https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1888935/ Tue, 11 Jun 2024 07:28:43 -0400 ...and a prequel to that workshop:
https://www.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/e/semiarab/arabistik/Seminar/termine/2024_04_VIANO_Chrysopoetics_.html

]]> 0 d2283ce71b76f27dbbee70a04ae412f2 Alexandre Roberts posted an update in the group Alchemy: Abstracts from recent workshop at the Freie Universität […] https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1888934/ Tue, 11 Jun 2024 07:28:17 -0400 Abstracts from recent workshop at the Freie Universität Berlin on "Chrysopoetic Recipes and Chemical Theory in Medieval Greek and Arabic Texts," convened by L. Rau and A.M. Roberts:
https://www.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/e/semiarab/arabistik/Seminar/termine/2024_05_RAU-ROBERTS_Chrysopoetics.html

]]> 0 8dabf77297be7b4b74ddf24f5cec1cf8 Alexandre Roberts deposited Thinking about Chemistry in Byzantium and the Islamic World in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1868371/ Mon, 18 Dec 2023 03:00:02 -0500 This article investigates several discussions of “chemistry,” understood as an analysts’ category referring to theories and practices dealing with the structure and transformation of matter. By reading these texts (a treatise defending kīmiyāʾ by al-Fārābī, the famous passage from Ibn Sīnā’s Shifāʾ on transmutation, Ibn Taymiyyah’s fatwā…[Read more]

]]> 0 8cfdaf5eed58baa8aab001c7ce47dda8 Alexandre Roberts deposited Thinking about Chemistry in Byzantium and the Islamic World in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1867262/ Sat, 09 Dec 2023 03:00:03 -0500 The term “alchemy,” born out of early modern professional polemics among chemists, is problematic as a historical category. The present article shifts away from asking what pre-modern alchemy “really” was, to asking how medieval scholars writing in Greek and Arabic thought about the practice of treating and combining naturally occurring substan…[Read more]

]]> 0 951533c61f8be326ac9096d8a96cba22 Francesco Luzzini deposited Harvesting Underground: (re)generative theories and vegetal analogies in the early modern debate on mineral ores (I) in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1858433/ Thu, 14 Sep 2023 01:06:45 -0400 The early modern use of vegetal terms to explain the origin and growth of ores was widespread in mining industry, alchemy, and natural philosophy. In the writings of authors from many different backgrounds, mineral veins were often described as ‘trees’ which moved upwards, bore fruits, and underwent a life cycle. Accordingly, the existence in ore…[Read more]

]]> 0 51f3862e3de08ebff2dd6b566454e54e Salam Rassi deposited Alchemy in an Age of Disclosure: The Case of an Arabic Pseudo-Aristotelian Treatise and its Syriac Christian “Translator” in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1828605/ Sat, 07 Jan 2023 02:24:45 -0500 This article examines a little-known and unstudied alchemical treatise, The Epistle on Alchemy (al-Risāla fī l-ṣināʿa) attributed to Aristotle, purportedly translated from Syriac into Arabic by the Nestorian bishop ʿAbdīshōʿ bar Brīkhā (d. 1318). In particular, I investigate the Epistle’s discourse on the concealment and revelation of alchemical…[Read more]

]]> 0 9757fa1eed3acfceb5fe35443a2d761e Olivier Dufault deposited Early Greek Alchemy, Patronage and Innovation in Late Antiquity in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1816079/ Sun, 02 Oct 2022 02:23:43 -0400 New evidence on scholarly patronage under the Roman empire can be garnered by analyzing the descriptions of learned magoi in several texts from the second to the fourth century CE. Since a common use of the term magos connoted flatterer-like figures (kolakes), it is likely that the figures of “learned sorcerers” found in texts such as Luc…[Read more]

]]> 0 b30a7f85da136c5614c7246193324c55 Elisabeth Moreau deposited Learning the Chymical Compromise: Paracelsian and Galenic Medicine in Marburg Disputations on Chymiatria in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1786950/ Wed, 13 Jul 2022 02:26:51 -0400 The chair of chymiatria created at the University of Marburg was among the earliest academic initiatives aiming to integrate chymistry into the medical curriculum. If its practical applications in pharmacy and its relationship with patronage have been examined by historians, the theoretical part of the chymiatria programme still remains to be…[Read more]

]]> 0 1c39d5209e0de0956d5f3bc56489fcd8 Elisabeth Moreau deposited Atoms, Mixture, and Temperament in Early Modern Medicine: The Alchemical and Mechanical Views of Sennert and Beeckman in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1775263/ Mon, 21 Mar 2022 02:23:38 -0400 Centred on the eclectic sources of early modern neo-atomistic medicine, this chapter examines the physiological theory of German alchemist Daniel Sennert (1572–1637) and Dutch engineer Isaac Beeckman (1588–1637). Both university-trained physicians, they followed Galenic medicine in explaining the structure and functioning of the human body at the…[Read more]

]]> 0 2dc09d747aecee0459506a6259cc20c0 Elisabeth Moreau deposited Vegetal Analogy in Early Modern Medicine: Generation as Plant Cutting in Sennert’s Early Treatises (1611–1619) in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1740514/ Fri, 04 Jun 2021 02:24:34 -0400 This chapter examines the use of vegetal analogy in late Renaissance physiology through the case of the German physician Daniel Sennert (1572–1637). It is centered on Sennert’s explanation of generation, in particular the transmission of life through the vegetative soul within the seed, as developed in his early works on medicine and alchemy, the…[Read more]

]]> 0 caecb3024c1ea3f2b7a93b698e38e4bb Elisabeth Moreau deposited Matter–Form (Hylomorphism) in Early Modern Alchemy in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1725434/ Fri, 29 Jan 2021 02:24:17 -0500 Hylomorphism is a recent term in the history of philosophy and the sciences. What was used from Antiquity to the early modern period was the terminological couple “matter” and “form.” According to the Aristotelian physics, matter and form are indissociable principles which constitute the elements and preside over the generation and destruc…[Read more]

]]> 0 4f9cd4013b4f57b2d6b94943079c8a16 Francesco Luzzini deposited Sounding the depths of providence: Mineral (re)generation and human-environment interaction in the early modern period in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1717047/ Tue, 17 Nov 2020 02:23:38 -0500 The genesis and growth of minerals, as well as the existence in ore veins of such organic features as 'seeds', 'matrices', and 'nourishment', remained central and recurrent issues for natural philosophers, technicians, alchemists and practitioners throughout early modern Europe. By providing an overview of the main themes, voices, and concurrent…[Read more]

]]> 0 65272eae2c0d10e8e1e49e3d673b0b4e Elisabeth Moreau deposited Libavius, Andreas in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1714040/ Thu, 22 Oct 2020 02:23:38 -0400 In the history of early modern science, the German physician Andreas Libavius (Halle, Saxony, c.1550–Coburg, Bavaria, 1616) is known for having promoted the institutionalization of alchemy in the academic sphere along with the creation of laboratories and instruments. Libavius was also remarkable for his extended network of scholarly friends and f…[Read more]

]]> 0 cfb6515bf28c7521818d1fb260a45020 Alexandre Roberts deposited Framing a Middle Byzantine Alchemical Codex in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1697980/ Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:14:58 -0400 This article analyzes the famous tenth-century Greek alchemical codex Marcianus graecus 299, and in particular its first quire, considering the structure and significance of the manuscript as a whole.

]]> 0 1a2bcc84812052192ac137f666671fd6 Olivier Dufault deposited Review of Nicolaidis (ed.) Greek Alchemy from Late Antiquity to Early Modernity in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1668886/ Tue, 29 Oct 2019 16:27:11 -0400 Review of Greek Alchemy from Late Antiquity to Early Modernity. Edited by EFTHYMIOS NICOLAIDIS. Pp. 198, illus., index. Brepols: Turnhout. 2018. £72. ISBN: 978-2-503-58191-0.

]]> 0 981896aef5702179fe2f8d95319b3563 Olivier Dufault deposited Transmutation Theory in the Greek Alchemical Corpus in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1641721/ Wed, 05 Jun 2019 16:31:44 -0400 This paper studies transmutation theory as found in the texts attributed to Zosimus of Panopolis,“the philosopher Synesius,” and “the philosopher Olym-piodorus of Alexandria.” It shows that transmutation theory (i.e. a theory explain-ing the complete transformation of substances) is mostly absent from the work attributed to these three authors…[Read more]

]]> 0 7f4f1c4eb0e17585460c208587353a04 Francesco Luzzini deposited Description, analogy, symbolism, faith. Jesuit science and iconography in the early modern debate on the origin of springs in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1594837/ Fri, 05 Jan 2018 05:40:31 -0500 By the end of the sixteenth century, many Jesuit colleges had become centers of excellence all over Europe for such disciplines as mathematics, astronomy, hydraulics, and mechanics. Not a few members of the order provided influential contributions to science: in the case of the study of waters, the inquisitive eye of Jesuits took part in the l…[Read more]

]]> 0 56f8e8d3b85d3448cf222eedb3e31726 Francesco Luzzini deposited Through dark and mysterious paths. Early modern science and the search for the origin of springs from the 16thto the 18thcenturies in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1594832/ Fri, 05 Jan 2018 05:40:29 -0500 Since its first attempts to understand natural phenomena, early modern science devoted great attention to the problematic issue of the origin of springs. This essay examines the lively debate that emerged from the studies on fresh water during the years spanning from the mid-sixteenth century to the early eighteenth. By focusing on the…[Read more]

]]> 0 3842bf04c8da710ee0a70ff83f51103d Francesco Luzzini deposited Matrices, not seeds. Vallisneri’s research on mines: between empiricism and philosophy in the group Alchemy https://hcommons.org/activity/p/1594826/ Fri, 05 Jan 2018 05:40:27 -0500 Since the beginning of his scientific activity the physician and naturalist Antonio Vallisneri
(1661-1730) devoted many studies to the Earth sciences. In those years his interest focused
particularly on the features of mineral kingdom and its relationship with spring water. The first
observations date back to the last decade of XVII century,…[Read more]

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