The Transmutations of Chymistry: Wilhelm Homberg and the Académie Royale des Sciences

481 Pages·2020·8.296 MB·English

by  Lawrence M. Principe

The Transmutations of Chymistry
Synthesis
A series in the history of chemistry, broadly construed, edited by Carin Berkowitz,
Angela N. H. Creager, John E. Lesch, Lawrence M. Principe, Alan Rocke, and E. C. Spary,
in partnership with the Science History Institute
The Transmutations
of Chymistry
Wilhelm Homberg and the
Académie Royale des Sciences
lawrence m. principe
The University of Chicago Press
Chicago and London
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2020 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in
critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the University of Chicago
Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637.
Published 2020
Printed in the United States of America
29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 1 2 3 4 5
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 70078- 6 (cloth)
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 70081- 6 (e- book)
doi: https:// doi .org/ 10 .7208/ chicago/ 9780226700816 .001 .0001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Principe, Lawrence, author.
Title: The transmutations of chymistry : Wilhelm Homberg and the Acadé mie royale
des sciences / Lawrence M. Principe.
Description: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2020. | Series:
Synthesis | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifi ers: lccn 2019054881 | isbn 9780226700786 (cloth) | isbn 9780226700816
(ebook)
Subjects: lcsh: Homberg, Wilhelm, 1652– 1715. | Acadé mie royale des sciences
(France) | Chemists—France—Biography. | Scientists—France—Biography. |
Chemistry—History—17th century. | Chemistry—History—18th century. |
Alchemy—History—17th century. | Alchemy—History—18th century. | lcgft:
Biographies.
Classifi cation: lcc qd22.h74 p75 2020 | ddc 540.92 [b]—dc23
lc record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019054881
This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso z39.48– 1992 (Permanence
of Paper).
Contents
List of Figures and Tables vii
List of Abbreviations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
1 A Merchant of the Marvelous 9
2 A Batavian in Paris 67
3 Essaying Chymistry 131
4 A New Chymical Light 172
5 Chrysopoeia at the Académie and the Palais Royal 232
6 Chymistry in Homberg’s Later Years: Practices,
Promises, Poisons, and Prisons 282
7 Homberg’s Legacy 338
Epilogue: Homberg and the Transmutations
of Chymistry at the Académie 396
Note on Sources 415
Sources Cited 431
Index 455

Figures and Tables
Figure 1.1. The special furnace for calcining the Bologna Stone 25
Figure 1.2. Homberg’s unpublished autograph memoir on the Bologna Stone 49
Figure 2.1. The Académie’s fi rst monthly publication of its Mémoires, in
January 1692 69
Figure 2.2. Samuel Cottereau Duclos 76
Figure 2.3. The headpiece by Sebastian Leclerc to the 1676 Histoire des plantes 100
Figure 2.4. Homberg’s scheme for isolating the dry volatile acid salt from
aquafort 103
Figure 2.5. The family of salts 105
Figure 2.6. Chymists at the Académie Royale des Sciences, 1666– 1720 121
Table 3.1. The evolution of Homberg’s “textbook” of chymistry 138
Figure 4.1. Homberg’s laboratory in the Palais Royal 174
Figure 4.2. Homberg’s laboratory and apartments in the Palais Royal 180
Figure 4.3. Homberg’s apartments in the Palais Royal 181
Figure 4.4. One of Tschirnhaus’s double- lens instruments 192
Figure 4.5. Graph showing the number of pages published by Homberg in the
annual Mémoires from 1699 to 1715 202
Figure 4.6. The calcination of antimony using focused sunlight 206
Figure 5.1. Metallic “vegetations” from Homberg, “Refl exions sur differentes
vegetations metalliques” 252
Figure 6.1. A nineteenth- century drawing of one of the medallions struck from the
gold produced by the transmuter Delisle in 1710 325
viii figures and tables
Figure 6.2. Conclusion of Homberg’s memoir on the sublimation of mercury,
presented twice, in 1697 and 1713 332
Figure 7.1. The Tschirnhaus lens bought by Karl I, Landgrave of
Hessen-K assel 350
Abbreviations
ads: Archives de l’Académie des Sciences, Paris
an: Archives Nationales, Paris
bmhn: Bibliothèque du Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris
bnf: Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris
bourdelin diary: Diary of Claude Bourdelin fi ls; BNF, MS NAF 5148
bourdelin expense account: “Memoire de la despence faitte par Monsieur
Bourdelin pour le Laboratoire de l’Academie Royalle des sciences” (1667– 99);
BNF, MS NAF 5147
hars: Histoire de l’Académie Royale des Sciences; see Note on Sources
hellot arsenal notebooks: BNF, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, MSS 3006– 8;
see Note on Sources
hellot caen notebooks: Caen, Bibliothèque Municipale, MS in- 4to 171, 9
vols.; see Note on Sources
hmars 1666– 99: Histoire et mémoires de l’Académie Royale des Sciences, 11 vols.
(Paris, 1729– 33); see note on sources
jds: Journal des Sçavans
lbr: Leibniz Briefe, Leibniz Archiv, NLB
mars: Mémoires de l’Académie Royale des Sciences; see Note on Sources
ms: Manuscript
naf: Nouvelles acquisitions françaises
nlb: Niedersächsische Landesbibliothek, Hannover
pv: Registres des procès- verbaux des séances, Archives de l’Académie des Sciences,
Paris
vma: Voenno- Meditsinskoi Akademii (Library of the Military- Medical Academy),
Boerhaave Archive, St. Petersburg, Russia