Image: Musaeum Hermeticum 1678 p 398 III. Clavis AQ27
Description: III. CLAVIS, the third key, engraved by Matthaeus Merian (1593–1650). From Tripus aureus, hoc est, Tres tractatus chymici selectissimi, nempe I. Basilii Valentini, benedictini ordinis monachi, Germani, practica una cum 12. clavibus et appendice, ex germanico; II. Thomae Nortoni, angli philosophi crede mihi seu ordinale, ante annos 140. ab authore seriptum, nunc ex anglicano manuscripto in latinum translatum, phrasi eujusque authoris ut et sententia retenta; III. Cremeri cuiusdam abbatis westmonasteriensis angli testamentum, hactenus nondum publicatum, nunc in diversarum nationum gratiam editi, et figuris cupro affabre incisis ornati operâ et studio. Michaelis Maieri, phil. et med. d. com. p. &c. Francofurti, apud Hermannum à Sande. MDCLXXVII. as published in the collection Musaeum hermeticum, reformatum et amplificatum. Francofurti : Apud Hermannum à Sande, 1678. In Latin. The part in question 'I. Basilii Valentini, benedictini ordinis monachi, Germani, practica una cum 12. clavibus et appendice, ex germanico;' or 'Basil Valentine, a German monk of the Benedictine order, one study with the twelve keys and the appendix, [translated] from the German.' Basil Valentine in his writings provided twelve “keys,” a widely reproduced sequence of alchemical operations encoded allegorically, both in words and in images. The images were essential to the communication and had to depict the same scene, regardless of the artistry. The third of Basil Valentine’s keys shows a winged dragon with coiled tail and pointed tongue in the foreground of a landscape with high mountains and a city or castle in the background. On the left behind the dragon is a running wolf or fox with a bird in its mouth. The fox, in turn, is being attacked by a cockerel on its back: a rooster is eating a fox eating a rooster. What could this possibly symbolize? Lawrence Principe, professor of chemistry and history of science at Johns Hopkins University, has discovered the surprising answer along with an equally surprising chemical sophistication. The rooster symbolizes gold (from its association with sunrise and the sun’s association with gold), and the fox represents aqua regia, a combination of nitric and hydrochloric acid that dissolves gold. The repetitive dissolving, heating, and redissolving (the rooster eating the fox eating the rooster) leads to the buildup of chlorine gas in the flask. The gold then volatilizes in the form of gold chloride, whose red crystals were known as dragon’s blood. The reaction was not reported in modern chemical literature until 1890.
Title: III. CLAVIS, the third key
Credit: Chemical Heritage Foundation
Author: Merian, Matthaeus, 1593-1650
Permission: This file was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the Chemical Heritage Foundation as part of a cooperation project. کوردیی ناوەندی | English | العربية | Français | Italiano | Македонски | Nederlands | Português | +/− This is a faithful photographic reproduction of a two-dimensional, public domain work of art. The work of art itself is in the public domain for the following reason: This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less. You must also include a United States public domain tag to indicate why this work is in the public domain in the United States. This file has been identified as being free of known restrictions under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights. The official position taken by the Wikimedia Foundation is that "faithful reproductions of two-dimensional public domain works of art are public domain". This photographic reproduction is therefore also considered to be in the public domain in the United States. In other jurisdictions, re-use of this content may be restricted; see Reuse of PD-Art photographs for details.
Usage Terms: Public domain
License: Public domain
Attribution Required?: No
Image usage
There are no pages that link to this image.