Alchemy is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practised in China, India, the Muslim world, and Europe. In its Western form, alchemy is first attested in a number of pseudepigraphical texts written in Greco-Roman Egypt during the first few centuries AD.
The philosopher's stone is a mythic alchemical substance capable of turning base metals such as mercury into gold or silver; it was also known as "the tincture" and "the powder". Alchemists additionally believed that it could be used to make an elixir of life which made possible rejuvenation and immortality.
Chinese alchemy is a historical Chinese approach to alchemy, a pseudoscience. According to original texts such as the Cantong qi, the body is understood as the focus of cosmological processes summarized in the five agents of change, or Wuxing, the observation and cultivation of which leads the practitioner into alignment and harmony with the Tao. Therefore, the traditional view in China is that alchemy focuses mainly on longevity and the purification of one's spirit, mind and body, providing, health, longevity and wisdom, through the practice of Qigong and wuxingheqidao. The consumption and use of various concoctions known as alchemical medicines or elixirs, each of which having different purposes but largely were concerned with immortality.
The Great Cross of Hendaye is a stone cross located on the town square of Hendaye, in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, in southwestern France. The cross includes references to apocalyptic beliefs about Christianity, Rosicrucianism, and alchemy. Many, including devotees of Nostradamus, the Bible Code, and especially the 2012 phenomenon, believed that a great comet would pass by, or crash into the earth in the year 2012, and interpreted the Cross of Hendaye as another reminder that 2012 would be the end.
Alphonse Elric is a fictional character and one of the protagonists in the Fullmetal Alchemist manga series and its adaptations created by Hiromu Arakawa. Alphonse is a child who lost his body during an alchemical experiment to bring his deceased mother back to life and had his soul attached to a suit of armor by his older brother Edward. As a result, Alphonse is almost invulnerable as long as the armor's seal is not erased, but is unable to feel anything. To recover their bodies, the Elrics travel around their country Amestris to obtain the Philosopher's Stone—an alchemical object that could restore them. In the animated adaptations of Fullmetal Alchemist, Alphonse is voiced by Rie Kugimiya in Japanese. In the English adaptations, he is voiced by Aaron Dismuke in the first series and by Maxey Whitehead in the second.
Adam McLean is a Scottish writer on alchemical texts and symbolism. In 1978 he founded the Hermetic Journal which he published until 1992 during which time he also started publishing the Magnum Opus Hermetic Sourceworks, a series of 55 editions of key source texts of the hermetic tradition. From 2004 he began collecting tarot cards in order to document tarot art and built up a collection of 2500 items. In 2016 he set up the Surrealism Website in order to document surrealist painters. This currently shows the work of 100 surrealist artists. He also created a series of 20 video lectures on many facets of surrealist paintings. In 2017 he set up an art gallery The Studio and Gallery in Kilbirnie in North Ayrshire in order to promote the work of emergent and lesser-known artists. In 2023 McLean began publishing, in book form, his Alchemical Translations Series of translations of 16-18th Century German, Latin and French alchemical works previously unavailable in English. This project is intended to expand the public's perception of the richness of alchemical literature.
In alchemy, the term chrysopoeia refers to the artificial production of gold, most commonly by the alleged transmutation of base metals such as lead. A related term is argyropoeia, referring to the artificial production of silver, often by transmuting copper. Although alchemists pursued many different goals, the making of gold and silver remained one of the defining ambitions of alchemy throughout its history, from Zosimus of Panopolis to Robert Boyle (1627–1691).
Scar, also known as Scarred Man, is a fictional character from the Fullmetal Alchemist manga series and its adaptations created by Hiromu Arakawa. Scar is introduced as a villain who targets alchemists working for the state military from the fictional country of Amestris. Scar hails from the region of Ishval whose people were almost exterminated in a previous civil war against the state military, most notably their alchemists. His alias is derived from the prominent X-shaped scar that decorates his brow with his birth name being unknown. As the series continues, Scar's backstory is further explored and he questions his motives, eventually joining the side of the Amestrian State military, assisting in an armed coup against the government in order to defeat the organization secretly responsible for the Ishvalan Civil War.
George Starkey (1628–1665) was a Colonial American alchemist, medical practitioner, and writer of numerous commentaries and chemical treatises that were widely circulated in Western Europe and influenced prominent men of science, including Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton. After relocating from New England to London, England, in 1650, Starkey began writing under the pseudonym Eirenaeus Philalethes. Starkey remained in England and continued his career in medicine and alchemy until his death in the Great Plague of London in 1665.
Muḥammad ibn Umayl al-Tamīmī, known in Latin as Senior Zadith, was an early Muslim alchemist who lived from c. 900 to c. 960 AD.
Johann Friedrich Schweitzer or Sweitzer, usually known as Helvetius was a Dutch physician and alchemical writer of German extraction. He is known for his books Ichts aus Nichts, für alle Begierigen der Natur published in 1655, Vitulus Aureus, published in 1667 under the pseudonym Joakim Philander, and Miraculo transmutandi Metallica, Antwerp, 1667.
The Mutus Liber, or Mute Book, is a Hermetic philosophical work published in La Rochelle in 1677. It ranks amongst the major books on alchemy in Early Modern literature, just as much as does Atalanta Fugiens by Michael Maier. It has been reprinted numerous times.
Jacques Bergier was a chemical engineer, member of the French-resistance, spy, journalist and writer. He co-wrote the best-seller The Morning of the Magicians with Louis Pauwels as a work of "fantastic realism".
A Tábua De Esmeralda is the 11th studio album by Brazilian singer-songwriter and guitarist Jorge Ben. It was released in 1974 by Philips Records.
Alchemy in the medieval Islamic world refers to both traditional alchemy and early practical chemistry by Muslim scholars in the medieval Islamic world. The word alchemy was derived from the Arabic word كيمياء or kīmiyāʾ and may ultimately derive from the ancient Egyptian word kemi, meaning black.
Eugène Léon Canseliet, was a French writer and alchemist. He was a student of the mysterious alchemist known as Fulcanelli. He wrote the preface for each of his master's books. Later in his life after his master died, he took a quiet life in France and continued to study and practice what Fulcanelli taught him, taking on students.
The Alchemical Door, also known as the Alchemy Gate or Magic Portal, is a monument built between 1678 and 1680 by Massimiliano Palombara, marquis of Pietraforte, in his residence, the villa Palombara, which was located on the Esquiline Hill, near Piazza Vittorio, in Rome. This is the only one of five former gates of the villa that remains; there was a lost door on the opposite side dating them to 1680 and four other lost inscriptions on the walls of the mansion inside the villa.
Serge Hutin was a French author of books on esoterica and the occult. He was born in France.
Solomon or Salomon Trismosin was a legendary Renaissance alchemist, claimed possessor of the philosopher's stone and teacher of Paracelsus. He is best known as the author of the alchemical works Splendor Solis and Aureum Vellus.
