''The Hermetical Triumph: or, The Victorious Philosophical Stone''. is an

alchemical Alchemy (from Arabic: ''al-kīmiyā''; from Ancient Greek: χυμεία, ''khumeía'') is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practiced in China, India, the Muslim world, ...

text published in London in 1723 by P. Hanet. It is subtitled "A Treatise more compleat and more intelligible than any has been yet, concerning The Hermetical Magistery". Its subject matter centres around an early seventeenth century German dialogue, ''The Ancient War of the Knights''. A commentary is included.

Textual history

''The Ancient War of the Knights'' was composed in German by an unknown author. It appeared in print at Leipzig, in 1604. In 1689, Alexandre-Toussaint de Limojon de Saint-Didier made the French translation as ''Le triomphe hermetique, ou La pierre philosophale victorieuse'' (Amsterdam: chez Henry Wetstein). The French text was included in the Bibliothèque des Philosophes Chimiques (1672–73). Another English edition was printed by F. Noble of London in 1740.

In ''The Ancient War of the Knights'', a debate takes place between

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

, mercury and the

philosopher's stone The philosopher's stone or more properly philosophers' stone (Arabic: حجر الفلاسفة, , la, lapis philosophorum), is a mythic alchemical substance capable of turning base metals such as mercury into gold (, from the Greek , "gold", ...

. Mercury only plays a minor part in the discourse. Two translations appear in the Hermetic Triumph. The first of these was translated from the original German into Latin, then French, and then finally English. The second "revised version" was translated directly from German into English.British Pharmaceutical Conference. ''Year-book of pharmacy. With the proceedings (transactions) of the British pharmaceutical conference''. 1870. p.105 The Hermetic Triumph also contains a discourse between "Eudoxes and Pyrophilus upon the Ancient War of the Knights". Composed as a dialogue between the characters of Eudoxes and Pyrophilus, it serves as a commentary on the main text of the book.

References

External links

1723 Edition. Internet Archive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hermetical Triumph, The 1723 books 1720s in London Alchemical documents Dialogues

Textual history

Contents

References

External links