Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

[bi3mw]

Ok, here is a nice test setup for the "Great Work" The result is red mercury sulfide ( vermilion, HgS).
Although it is hard to believe that the alchemists made it so simple, it is the very simplicity that makes it so plausible.

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The red mercury sulfide, vermilion, finally had several properties that made it a good candidate for the philosopher's stone: it is red, heavy (like gold) and - like gold - does not dissolve in any acid except aqua regia. The fact that it could not be used to cause transmutation could have been interpreted as follows: the starting materials were not pure enough. And for this there was a way out: one subjects the vermilion to the dry heating and it distills off mercury again - the mercurius can be recovered "purified" and used again for the "great work".

It is to be noted that a process similar to the one described was already known to the alchemist Jabir ibn Hayyan (722-804) and was written down in detail in his book of color recipes.

So did vermilion-makers think they might actually be making the Philosopher’s stone? When I give talks about colour-making chemistry, I have always taken care to disabuse audiences of that idea. Jabir’s Sulfur and Mercury are subtle, intangible ‘principles’, I say, and not the same thing as the earthly elements extracted from the ground. ‘Alchemists said that sulfur is not Sulfur and mercury is not Mercury,’ warns Bucklow – so vermilion ‘is a poor “material copy” of a “spiritual pattern.”

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