Have you ever wondered about alchemy? Is it really only about turning iron into gold? As you may have guessed, the answer is no...or this would be a very stupid article. But I digress.

The definition given for alchemy in The New Merriam-Webster Dictionary is as follows:

medieval chemistry chiefly concerned with efforts to turn base metals into gold

This definition is true in the historical sense. Alchemy preceded modern chemistry, so in many ways, alchemists were the first chemists. Alchemy was based on the beliefs of Aristotle, who believed that:
1) All things tend to reach perfection
2) All things on earth are made from different combinations of the 4 elements: earth, air, fire, water.

Since all the other metals were considered less 'perfect' then gold, alchemists assumed that by properly manipulating other metals, they could cause them to reach perfection and turn into gold. Modern alchemists, however, call alchemy a 'proto-chemistry' and say that a lot of its teachings and philosophies are still relevant to us today.

Symbolism is used extensively in alchemy, and animal symbols are especially popular. There are special signs which are used to represent certain substances and processes, but there are also other symbols which are used to represent ideas and stuff like that. There is no defined meanings for these symbols, however, and the same symbol may be used in different ways by different alchemists. This makes it hard to tell what the symbols mean, and they must be taken in context with the rest of the text we are reading. Alchemical symbolism has been examined by a number psychologists, namely Jung, in his book Psychology and Alchemy.

Allegories are also used in alchemy. For those of us who don't know (like me until about 5 minutes ago) an allegory is a story in which a symbolic figure has some experience that is supposed to teach us something...like fables or fairy tales or myths I guess. Anyway, in typical alchemical allegories, a figure with which the audience is supposed to identify goes on some journey, meets some typical people (like kings, queens, birds, and animals) and witnesses some kind of transformation.

Some of the great alchemical writers also wrote about alchemy in relation to mysticism and religious ideas. For many alchemists, the alchemical transmutation process was a kind of mystical purification.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:
The Alchemy Web Site

© Copyright Sabrina Wish 1998