Dress Like an Alchemist 7

Title: La toyson d'or = The Golden Fleece
Author: Salomon Trismosin (Wikipedia: Splendor Solis)
Edition: 1612
Online Source: Hathi Trust

The frontispiece plus two addition portraits (here and here).

I've added the two images below to the Dress Like an Alchemist Flickr album.

Dress Like an Alchemist 6

Title: De distillatione = About Distillation
Author: Giambattista Della Porta (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1608
Online Source: Hathi Trust

This portrait of Della Porta appears at the front of the book, and you will also find this image at the Dress Like an Alchemist Flickr album.

Dress Like an Alchemist 1

Title: Hermetico-Spagyrisches Lustgärtlein = Hermetico-Spagyrical Pleasure Garden
Author: Lucas Jennis, engraver (Wikipedia) and Johann Grasshoff (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1625
Online Source: Wolfenbüttel: Herzog August Library

Here is the link for this particular image: page 113; see also this page at the Hathi Trust (badly damaged).

I've added this to the Dress Like an Alchemist Flickr album.

Detail:

Library. Camerarius. Symbola et Emblemata

Title: Symbolorum et Emblematum Centuriae Quatuor = 400 Symbols and Emblems
Author: Joachim Camerarius (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1668
Online Source: Hathi Trust

These are not alchemy books, but they are emblem books from the natural world, and as such you will see a lot of overlap in the symbolic and emblematic language. Camerarius published four books of emblems — plants, animals, birds, and reptiles — 100 emblems in each book, with each emblem accompanied by a Latin distich along with an essay in Latin. Later, these four books were then collected into a single volume, Symbolorum et Emblematum Centuriae Quatuor, which is what I have listed above. To find the single volumes, with much higher quality page scans, visit the University of Munich Digital Library: plants — animals — birds — reptiles.

Here is an example where Camerarius (reptiles 83) includes a symbol beloved of the alchemists also: the ouroboros:

Rebus in humanis adeo in se cuncta recurrunt,

   Finis ut unius sit caput alterius.

In human affairs, (in humanis rebus) all things (cuncta) revolve into one another (recurrunt in se) such that (adeo us) the tail-end of one thing (finis unius) is the head-start of another (sit caput alterius).

I made a poster for this one as part of my Latin distich project:

Library. Books by Arthur Edward Waite.

Since I mentioned A. E. Waite in the Twitter chat last night, I thought I would include a list of his books for the Library entry today. His books are in the public domain and they give a great perspective on the re-discovery of alchemy in the 19th and early 20th century by people interested in the mystical, spiritual, and psychological dimensions of alchemy. Some other time I'll check to see if there are other works of his online that I did not find at the incredible Hathi Trust!

Author: Arthur Edward Waite (Wikipedia)
Titles with links to Hathi Trust online editions:

1. Hathi. A lyric of the fairy land, and other poems. 1879.
2. Hathi. Israfel; letters, visions and poems. 1886.
3. Hathi. The mysteries of magic: a digest of the writings of Eliphas Lévi. 1886.
4. Hathi. The real history of the Rosicrucians founded on their own manifestoes, and on facts and documents collected from the writings of initiated brethren. 1887.
5. Hathi. A soul's comedy. 1887.
6. Hathi. Elfin music: an anthology of English fairy poetry. 1888.
7. Hathi. Lives of alchemystical philosophers based on materials collected in 1815 and supplemented by recent researches. 1888.
8. Hathi. The book of black magic and of facts; including the rites and mysteries of Goëtic theury, sorcery, and infernal necromancy. 1890.
9. Hathi. The Hermetic museum, restored and enlarged: most faithfully instructing all disciples of the sopho-spagyric art how that greatest and truest medicine of the philosopher's stone. 1893.
10. Hathi. The triumphal chariot of antimony. By Basilius Valentinus. With the commentary of Theodore Kerckringius. 1893.
11. Hathi. A new light of mysticism : Azoth; or, The star in the east. 1893.
12. Hathi. The hermetic and alchemical writings of Aureolus Philippus Theophrastus Bombast, of Hohenheim, called Paracelsus the Great. 1894.
13. Hathi. The new pearl of great price : a treatise concerning the treasure and most precious stone of the philosophers, or, the method and procedure of this divine art. 1894.
14. Hathi. Lucasta, parables and poems. 1894.
15. Hathi. Alchemy the turba philosophorum; or, Assembly of the sages, called also the book of truth in the art and the third Pythagorical synod; / an ancient alchemical treatise. 1896.
16. Hathi. Devil-worship in France; or, The question of Lucifer; a record of things seen and heard in the secret societies. 1896.
17. Hathi. The doctrine and literature of the kabalah. 1902.
18. Hathi. A book of mystery and vision. 1902.
19. Hathi. Studies in mysticism and certain aspects of the secret tradition. 1906.
20. Hathi. Strange houses of sleep. 1906.
21. Hathi. Steps to the crown. 1907.
22. Hathi. The hidden church of the Holy Graal, its legends and symbolism considered in their affinity with certain mysteries of initiation and other traces of a secret tradition. 1909.
23. Hathi. The secret tradition in Freemasonry and an analysis of the inter-relation between the craft and the high grades. 1911.
24. Hathi. The secret tradition in Goëtia, The book of ceremonial magic including the rites and mysteries of Goëtic theurgy, sorcery and infernal necromancy. 1911.
25. Hathi. The history of magic, including a clear and precise exposition of its procedure, its rites and its mysteries, by Éliphas Lévi. 1913.
26. Hathi. The collected poems of Arthur Edward Waite. 1914.
27. Hathi. The works of Thomas Vaughan :Eugeniys Philalethes. 1919.
28. Hathi. A new encyclopædia of freemasonry (ars magna latomorum) and of cognate instituted mysteries; their rites, literature and history. 1921.
29. Hathi. The book of the Holy Graal. 1921.
30. Hathi. Raymund Lully, illuminated doctor, alchemist and Christian mystic. 1922.
31. Hathi. Saint-Martin, the French mystic, and the story of modern Martinism. 1922.
32. Hathi. Lamps of western mysticism; essays on the life of the soul in God. 1923.
33. Hathi. The life of Louis Claude de Saint-Martin, the unknown philosopher, and the substance of his transcendental doctrine. 1901.

And yes, this is the Waite of the Rider-Waite tarot deck. :-)

The Sun.

Library. Splendor Solis: Alchemical Treatises of Solomon Trismosin

Title: Splendor Solis: Alchemical Treatises of Solomon Trismosin
Author: "J. K." (see Wikipedia for more on Splendor Solis)
Edition: 1920
Online Source: Hathi Trust
Online Source: British Museum (for an illuminated ms. in color)

We are very fortunate that there is a convenient English edition of Splendor Solis that you can read online, while being able to see a beautiful German manuscript version with colored paintings. Here is what Wikipedia says about the book:

The author of the manuscript was considered to be a legendary Salomon Trismosin, allegedly the teacher of Paracelsus. The work itself consists of a sequence of 22 elaborate images, set in ornamental borders and niches. The symbolic process shows the classical alchemical death and rebirth of the king, and incorporates a series of seven flasks, each associated with one of the planets. Within the flasks a process is shown involving the transformation of bird and animal symbols into the Queen and King, the white and the red tincture. 

Below I have made an animated gif using the images from the British Museum online manuscript.

You can read J.K.'s description of the 22 images, and you can also ponder his contention that they mirror the cards of the Major Arcana of a Tarot deck, which also number 22.

Library. The Ripley Scrolls

Title: The “Ingendred” Stone: The Ripley Scrolls and the Generative Science of Alchemy
Author: Aaron Kitch
Edition: Huntington Library Quarterly, Volume 78, number 1, 2015.
Online Source: Kitch at Bowdoin

When trying to figure out what was happening with the zodiac woman in the Aurora Consurgens yesterday, I came across this wonderful article online that I think might be of interest to people in #NetNarr for the gender/generation theme and for the beautiful art. Here is the abstract:

Acquired at auction in 1958 from the library of C. W. Dyson Perrins, the Huntington Library’s Ripley scroll (HM 30313) is one of the most ornate and esoteric illuminated manuscripts of early modern England. Much remains unknown about the iconology and historical context of the Ripley scrolls, of which approximately twenty remain worldwide. The self-consciously archaic scroll at the Huntington draws on a range of contemporary sources, including emblem books, heraldic imagery, and illuminated alchemical manuscripts from the fifteenth century, such as the Rosarium philosophorum and the Aurora consurgens. Aaron Kitch situates the Ripley scrolls in the context of English alchemy in the sixteenth century, especially the tradition of emblematic alchemy and John Dee’s efforts to establish George Ripley as England’s chief alchemical authority. He analyzes the pattern of imagery on the scrolls in relation to the ancient and early modern philosophy of generation, which focused on questions about sexual reproduction and the emergence of new matter in nature.

keywords: George Ripley; John Dee; Paracelsus; illuminated manuscripts; early modern alchemy; generation; Aurora consurgens

There is also some basic background at Wikipedia.

Here is one of the images: Three naked figures support a fountain, which itself contains naked figures, as philosophers stand on pinnacles around the fountain; a green dragon and a frog below.

Details:

Library. Aurora Consurgens.

Title: Aurora Consurgens (Wikipedia)
Edition: 15th-century ms.
Online Source: e-codices

I feel so lucky to have discovered this book online! Here's how I found it: Sandy Brown Jensen shared a lovely morning song at the Twitter for #NetNarr, and that inspired me to see what I could find by Googling Aurora (the goddess of dawn) and alchemy. And look what Google led me to: Aurora Consurgens: "The Aurora consurgens is an alchemical treatise of the 15th century famous for the rich illuminations that accompany it."

There is a helpful description of the images here, but you might see things differently. For example, in the case of the woman below, I'm pretty sure that has to be menstruation, not childbirth, as the description suggests. The zodiac calendar would seem to connect with the monthly period, right?

Even better, the Zurich version of the manuscript is online! Here are some of my favorite images; you can browse the manuscript for yourself and see which ones you like best:

(page)

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Library. Stoltzius. Hortulus hermeticus

Title: Hortulus hermeticus = The Hermetic Garden
Hortulus hermeticus flosculis philosophorum cupro incisis conformatus, & breuissimis versiculis explicatus
Author: Daniel Stoltzius von Stoltzenberg (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1627
Online Source: Hathi Trust

I would like to find a cleaner scan of this if I can, but I have not had any luck. The little emblems for the philosophers are so fascinating! I'll just do the first two here; this is a book I could really enjoy working on from start to finish. There are 160 of these little emblems:

Hermes Trismegistos, Aegiptius.

Quod est superius est sicut id quod est inferius.

That which is above is as that which is below.

(You will find these words in the Tabula Smaragdina.)

Adfar Alexandrinus, Praceptor Morieni.

Sol coniugii nostri est pater, mater vero Luna Alba.

The father of our union is the Sun; the mother indeed is the White Moon.

(You can read about Morien in The Lives of Alchemystical Philosophers by Francis Barrett.)

Library. Stoltzius. Viridarium chymicum (2)

And here is the second round of emblems from the Viridarium chymicum in animated form (details here):

Library. Stoltzius. Viridarium chymicum

Title: Viridarium chymicum = A Chemical Pleasure-Garden
Author: Daniel Stoltzius von Stoltzenberg (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1624
Online Source: e-Rara (Jung Foundation: Alchemy, Magic and Kabbalah)

This is another fantastic emblem book; I have done just the first 50 emblems here; I will post the other 50 tomorrow. Unfortunately, this books is hard to find, but I just now learned how to access the page views at eRara, where there are higher-res images than in the PDF! Yes!!!

Library. Maier. Scrutinium Chymicum (= Atalanta Fugiens)

Title: Scrutinium Chymicum = A Chemical Investigation
Secretioris naturae secretorum scrutinium chymicum : per oculis et intellectui accuratè accommodata, figuris cupro appositissimè incisa, ingeniosissima emblemata, hisque confines, & ad rem egregiè facientes sententias, doctissimaque item epigrammata, illustratum
Author: Michael Maier (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1687
Online Source: Hathi Trust

This is a later edition of the Atalanta Fugiens (notably without the music!), and it is the nicest printed and scanned edition that I have found online. I have been working through the emblems one by one, and now that I found this lovely edition, I decided to make an animated gif of the pages with all 50 emblems:

Library. Horapollo. Hieroglyphs

Title: Hieroglyphika Ori Apollinis = Horapollo's Hieroglyphs
Hōrou Apollōnos neilōou Hieroglyphika. Ori Apollinis niliaci, De sacris notis & sculpturis libri duo
Author: Horapollo (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1551, with engravings reproduced from French edition of 1543
Online Source: Hathi Trust

There are many editions of the hieroglyphs of Horapollo, and I thought this was a very nicely illustrated edition. It has both Greek and Latin texts. Here are just a few of the engravings: gorgeous!

Library. Dee. Monas hieroglyphica

Title: Monas hieroglyphica = The Hieroglyphic Monad
Author: John Dee (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1564 (?)
Online Source: Hathi Trust

The book has its own article at Wikipedia. Here is an excerpt from that article:

The Hieroglyphic embodies Dee's vision of the unity of the Cosmos and is a composite of various esoteric and astrological symbols. Dee wrote a commentary on it which serves as a primer of its mysteries. However, the obscurity of the commentary is such that it is believed that Dee used it as a sort of textbook for a more detailed explanation of the Hieroglyph which he would give in person. In the absence of any remaining detail of this explanation we may never know the full significance of the Glyph.

The edition at Hathi Trust is a good scan, very readable. Here is the title page, which does indeed show the glyph:

There are some charts in the book, and I have selected some to include here:

Library. Maer. Arcana arcanissima

Title: Arcana arcanissima = The Most Secret Secrets
Arcana arcanissima, hoc est, Hieroglyphica aegyptio-graeca : vulgo necdum cognita, ad demonstrandam falsorum apud antiquos deorum, dearum, heroum, animantium, & institutorum pro sacris receptorum, originem, ex vno Aegyptiorum artificio, quod aureũ animi et corporis medicamentum peregit, deductam, vnde tot poëtarum allegoriae, scriptorum narrationes fabulosae et per totam encyclopaediam errores sparsi clarissima veritatis luce manifestantur, suaeq[ue] tribui singula restituuntur, sex libris exposita / authore Michaele Maiero
Author: Michael Maier (Wikipedia)
Edition: 1614
Online Source: Hathi Trust

Since I have been enjoying Michael Maier's Atalanta fugiens so much, I thought I would explore some of his other books. The contents of this book look very intriguing (with an index at the back to make it useful for research), but it is not illustrated. It has a lovely frontispiece, but that is the only illustration in the book (despite the title). All the rest is text (Latin).

p. 1. Liber Primus. De Hieroglyphicis Aegyptiorum.
p. 56. Liber Secundus. De Hieroglyphicis Graecorum, ac Primo de Allegoriis Auro Magis Conspicuis.
p. 95. Liber Tertius. De Aurea Deorum Dearumque Genealogia, ex qua tamquam arbore Philosophica innumeri rami Heroum Hieroglyphicorum propantantur.
p. 164. Liber Quartus. De Graeciae Festis ac Sacris, nec non certaminibus et Ludis pro memoria artificii Philosophici institutis et solemniter celebratis.
p. 209. Liber Quintus. De Herculis Laboribus.
p. 245. Liber Sextus. De Troiana Expeditione.
p. 287. Index Rerum.

Library. Khunrath. Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae

Title: Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae = The Amphitheater of Eternal Wisdom

Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae, solius verae, christiano-kabalisticum, divino-magicum, nec non physico-chymicum, tertriunum, catholicon / instructore Henrico Khunrath

Author: Heinrich Khunrath (Wikipedia)

Edition: 1609

Online Source: eRara Alchemy, Magic and Kabbalah 

Here is what Wikipedia says about the book:

His most famous work on alchemy is the Amphitheatrum Sapientiae Aeternae (Amphitheater of Eternal Wisdom), a work on the mystical aspects of that art, which contains the oft-seen engraving entitled "The First Stage of the Great Work", better-known as the "Alchemist's Laboratory". The book was first published at Hamburg in 1595, with four circular elaborate, hand-colored, engraved plates heightened with gold and silver which Khunrath designed and were engraved by Paullus van der Doort. The book was then made more widely available in an expanded edition with the addition of other plates published posthumously in Hanau in 1609. Amphitheatrum Sapientiae Aeternae is an alchemical classic, combining both Christianity and magic. In it, Khunrath showed himself to be an adept of spiritual alchemy and illustrated the many-staged and intricate path to spiritual perfection.

And here are all the illustrations: