Alchemy During The Renaissance Era

Alchemy is a concept that dates back as far as the Renaissance period, and while similar to sciences, was not at first considered a science due to its mystical aspects. Alchemy in particular began as the pursuit of gold and eternal life. It involved the transformation of items into other items, such as lead into gold, similar to the base concept of chemistry. During the Renaissance, alchemy evolved and came to revolve around empirical thinking, the basis of modern sciences. While Alchemy’s name has many connotations associated with cults and magic, it departed from those concepts during the Renaissance era. Alchemy served as the foundations that strengthened and furthered Chemistry and Physics in the Renaissance period.

Alchemy was defined

Most notably, Aristotle and his philosophy on elements. Aristotelian physics has five core elements: earth, water, air, fire, and aether from which all things are made from. These parallel modern ideas of the states of matter: solids, liquids, gases, and plasma, as well as how energy is transferred through objects. Many alchemists took these ideas and ran with it during the Renaissance period. Utilising the ideas of Aristotelian physics and other similar ideas of old Greek philosophers, alchemists were able to create new theories on the natural world. The reintroduction of these Greek concepts provided alchemists during the Renaissance a foundation to base concepts around. This rekindled interest in Greek ideas in the Renaissance’s scientific community leading to its prowess and

Notably, Sir Isaac Newton shared similar views on alchemy to Robert Boyle. Throughout Newton’s life, he wrote a plethora of alchemical writings, implying that most of his life was centered around alchemy. Because Newton had such a rich understanding of the medieval concept, it is believed that many of his scientific ideas were inspired by alchemy. Out of all of his ideas, the most important was his three laws of universal gravitation, considered the basis upon which modern physics and chemistry are based upon. He has been deemed the Einstein of the Renaissance for his immensely powerful