Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

[nablator]

I’ve seen speculation regarding the green lion and dragon being conflated, but no confirmation, and to my mind they are almost opposite in idea.

The confirmation is in closely related recipes of the 'vegetable' stone. The first step is to extract the blood of the green lion (see the blood exuding from the green dragon in Ripley's scrolls?) by dissolution in vinegar and distillation according to the Verbum abbreviatum de leone viridi attributed to Raymond Gaufredi (Raymundus Gaufridus) who allegedly got the recipe firsthand from Roger Bacon back when alchemy was the favorite hobby of monks. There are several surviving manuscripts of the 15th century, I don't know if any older ms. exists. Probably not.

From the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., the English translation published in 1685 of the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. of the Verbum abbreviatum:

In the Name of Christ then, take a great quantity of the strongest Vi∣negar diligently distilled through an Alembick, in which dissolve a good quantity of the Green Lyon, being dissolved, distil through a Filtre, and keep it in Glass Cucurbits well stopp'd: If any re∣markable part of the Lyon remains undissolved, dissolve it with the aforesaid Vinegar, and distil through a Filtre, and being dis∣solved, joyn it with the other Waters before reserved in the Cucurbits, then take the reserved Waters (dissolutions) and distil them all in Balneo Mariae, applying Alembicks to them well luted, that the Cucurbits may not respire, put Fire under, and receive all the Waters, which will be distilled, but have a care that the dissolved Lyon be not altogether congealed in the Cucur∣bits, but that it may remain liquid or soft; then take all the Cu∣curbits, and put all that is in them into one Cucurbit, which lute well with its Alembick, and put it in a Furnace of Ashes, as is fitting, and put a gentle Fire under, because of the temper of the Glass, and because of the Heterogeneous moisture, which is in the Lyon to be rooted out: And take notice, that must be always done with a gentle Fire, but when the Heterogeneous moisture is gone over, strengthen the Fire by little and little, and have an Eye continually to the Beak of the Alembick, if a red Liquor begins to go over, but if it does not yet go over, con∣tinue the aforesaid Fire till it doth; but when you see the red Li∣quor distil, change the Receiver forthwith, and lute it well to the Beak of the Alembick, and then strengthen the Fire, and you will have the Blood of the Lyon exceeding red, containing the four Elements, very odoriferous and fragrant (after due putre∣faction) keep it therefore in a good Phial well stopp'd: Then take the Blood, and put it in a Phial close stopp'd to putrefie and digest, in hot Dung, changing the Dung every five Days, there to be digested for the space of fifteen or sixteen Days, and this is done, that the Elementary parts may be dissolved, and be fitter to be divided into the four Elements, and that by distillation; being putrify'd fifteen or sixteen Days, take it out, and put it into a sit Cucurbit, to be distilled with a gentle Fire in Balneo Mariae;

I bet antimony was inserted into the older recipe based on sericon (see Jennifer Rampling's note 10 below) in this 1683 edition of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.:

First take 30 pound weight of Sericon or Antimony, which will make 21 pound weight of Gum, or near thereabouts, if it be well dissolved, and the Vinegar very good, and dissolve each pound thereof in a Gallon of twice distilled Vinegar when cold again, and as it standeth in Dissolution in a fit Glass Vessel, stirr it about with a clean Stick very often every day, the oftner the better, and when it is well moulten to the bottom, then filter over the said Liquors three several times, which keep close covered, and cast away the Feces, for that is superfluous filth which must be removed, and entreth not into the Work but is called Terra damnata.

The making of our Gum or green Lyon.

Then put all these cold Liquors thus filtered into a fit Glass Vessel, and set it into Balneo Mariae to evaporate in a temperate heat, which done our Sericon will be coagulated into a green Gum called our green Lyon, which Gum dry well, yet beware thou burn not his Flowers not destroy his greeness.

The Extraction of our Menstue, or blood of our green Lyon.

Then take out the said Gum, and put it into a strong Retort of Glass very well Luted, and place it in your Furnace, and under that at the first, make sober Fire, and anon you shall see a faint Water issue forth, let it waste away; but when you see a white Smoak or fume issue forth, then put too a Receiver of Glass, which must have a very large Belly, and the mouth no wider then it may well receive into that the Neck of the Retort, which close well together that no fume issue forth of the Receiver. Then encrease your Fire by little and little till the fume which issueth be reddish, then continue the greater Fire, until drops like blood come forth, and no more fume will issue forth, and when that leaveth bleeding let it cool or asswage the Fire by little and little, and when all things are cold, then take away the Receiver, and close it fast suddenly, that the Spirits vanish not away, for this Liquor is called, our blessed Liquor, which Liquor keep close stopped in a Glass till hereafter. Then look into the Neck of the Retort, and therein you shall find a white hard Ryme as it were the Congelation of a Frosty vapour or much like sublimate, which gather with diligence and keep it apart, for therein are contained great Secrets which shall be shewed hereafter, after the great Work is ended.

One basic recipe for the vegetable stone, found in hundreds of permutations in alchemical literature, employs a metallic body called ‘sericon’ as its prime matter: usually taken to denote minium (red lead). The minium is dissolved in strong wine vinegar, and the resulting solution heated until a thick gum remains in the bottom of the glass.10 When distilled, the gum yields a white vapour, the fumus albus, which is collected in a receiver and condensed to form a liquid, which is then subjected to further procedures. Owing to the circumstances of its manufacture, the vegetable stone was regarded as combining both mineral and vegetable qualities. In this form, it was regarded as a safe and legitimate product for human consumption, and therefore provided one basis for the medicinal aurum potabile—an objective which cannot have been assisted, in practice, by the use of toxic lead compounds.

I have elsewhere described this lead-and-vinegar method as ‘sericonian’, to distinguish it from approaches based on different ingredients and processes (Rampling, 2010, pp. 128–129). In England, this approach was commonly associated with the figure of George Ripley, a canon-regular of the Augustinian priory at Bridlington in East Yorkshire who flourished in the 1470s, as attested by the colophons of his best known works, the Compound of alchemy (1471) and Medulla alchimiae (1476).11 In the Medulla, for instance, Ripley gave instructions for the manufacture of the vegetable stone from sericon, and its subsequent combination with the mineral ‘fire against nature’ (a corrosive mixture of cinnabar, vitriol and saltpetre) to produce a powerful transmutational elixir—the aqua composita, or compound water (Ripley, 1649, pp. 143–145, 170–172).

10. The gum is sugar of lead, or, in modern parlance, lead acetate. In some cases ‘sericon’ is interpreted as verdigris, or copper acetate. In texts from the mid-sixteenth century onwards, it is often reinterpreted as antimony (Rampling, 2009, chap. 4).

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A variant by Samuel Norton:

Based on his close reading of Raymond’s Epistola accurtationis, Ripley’s Medulla, and
other sericonian authorities, Norton offers Elizabeth I his interpretation of the cover
names applied to successive stages of the vegetable stone’s manufacture. From lead
is made first adrop (minium), then sericon or the green lion (the gum made from min-
ium), menstruum (an oil drawn from the gum), and finally the blood of the green lion
(a menstruum made from the oil).68 The result is a complex and nuanced reading of
the various terms employed in sericonian practice—Norton’s only innovation being
to recast sericon as the gum (sugar of lead) rather than minium itself. Several decades
later, in 1599, Norton would record these steps in a handsome “tabula,” printed in
1630: a tree that sprouts, appropriately enough, from the body of the red toad (Bufo
rubea), which signifies lead (Saturnus plumbum; fig. 1).

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