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The practice of alchemy in the Western world, based on a Hellenistic and Babylonian approach to planetary astronomy, often ascribed a symbolic association between the seven then-known celestial bodies and the metals known to the Greeks and Babylonians during antiquity.
The seven metals known since Classical times in Europe were associated with the seven classical planets; this figured heavily in alchemical symbolism. The exact correlation varied over time, and in early centuries bronze or electrum were sometimes found instead of mercury, or copper for Mars instead of iron; however, gold, silver, and lead had ...
Calx – calcium oxide; was also used to refer to other metal oxides. Chalcanthum – the residue produced by strongly roasting blue vitriol (copper sulfate); it is composed mostly of cupric oxide. Chalk – a rock composed of porous biogenic calcium carbonate. CaCO 3; Chrome green – chromic oxide and cobalt oxide.
In alchemy, each classical planet (Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn) was associated with one of the seven metals known to the classical world (silver, mercury/quicksilver, copper, gold, iron, tin and lead respectively). As a result, the alchemical glyphs for the metal and associated planet coincide.
Whereas European alchemy eventually centered on the transmutation of base metals into noble metals, Chinese alchemy had a more obvious connection to medicine. [64] The philosopher's stone of European alchemists can be compared to the Grand Elixir of Immortality sought by Chinese alchemists.
The Mirror of Alchimy appeared at a time when there was an explosion of interest in Bacon, magic and alchemy in England. The evidence of this is seen in popular plays of the time such as Marlowe's Dr. Faustus (c. 1588), Greene's Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay (1589), and Jonson's The Alchemist (1610). [ 7 ]
Planetary symbols are used in astrology and traditionally in astronomy to represent a classical planet (which includes the Sun and the Moon) or one of the modern planets. The classical symbols were also used in alchemy for the seven metals known to the ancients, which were associated with the planets, and in calendars for the seven days of the week associated with the seven planets.
Khālid ibn Yazīd – credited with introducing alchemy to the Islamic world. Pseudo-Apollonius of Tyana – earliest known source of the sulfur-mercury theory of metals and the Emerald Tablet . Jābir ibn Hayyān – notable for the theory of the balance ( ʿilm al-mīzān ), the theory of artificial generation ( ʿilm al-takwīn ), and a ...