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Zosimos of Panopolis
Zosimos of Panopolis
1 Alchemy
In about 300 AD, Zosimos provided one of the rst definitions of alchemy as the study of the composition of
waters, movement, growth, embodying and disembodying, drawing the spirits from bodies and bonding the spirits within bodies.[5]
In general, Zosimos understanding of alchemy reects
the inuence of Hermetic and Gnostic spiritualities. He
asserted that the fallen angels taught the arts of metallurgy
to the women they married, an idea also recorded in
the Book of Enoch and later repeated in the Gnostic Apocryphon of John.[6] In a fragment preserved by
Syncellus, Zosimos wrote:
3 SURVIVING WORKS
As the sun is, so to speak, a ower of
the re and (simultaneously) the heavenly sun,
the right eye of the world, so copper when
it bloomsthat is when it takes the color of
gold, through puricationbecomes a terrestrial sun, which is king of the earth, as the sun
is king of heaven.[8]
One of Zosimos texts is about a sequence of dreams related to Alchemy, and presents the proto-science as a
much more religious experience. In his dream he rst
3 Surviving works
comes to an altar and meets Ion, who calls himself the
priest of inner sanctuaries, and I submit myself to an unendurable torment. Ion then ghts and impales Zosimos This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
with a sword, dismembering him in accordance with the
rule of harmony (referring to the division into four bod Authentic Memoirs
ies, natures, or elements). He takes the pieces of Zosimos to the altar, and burned (them) upon the re of the
The Book of Pictures (Muaf a-uwar)
art, till I perceived by the transformation of the body that
I had become spirit. From there, Ion cries blood, and
Concerning the true Book of Sophe, the Egyptian, and
horribly melts into the opposite of himself, into a muof the Divine Master of the Hebrews and the Sabaoth
tilated anthroparionwhich Carl Jung perceived as the
Powers (French translation)
rst concept of the homunculus in alchemical literature.
The Final Quittance (French translation)
Zosimos wakes up, asks himself, Is not this the composition of the waters?" and returns to sleep, beginning the
On the Evaporation of the Divine Water that xes
visions againhe constantly wakes up, ponders to himMercury (French translation )
self and returns to sleep during these visions. Return On the Letter Omega (English excerpt translated by
ing to the same altar, Zosimos nds a man being boiled
G.R.S. Mead; French translation)
alive, yet still alive, who says to him, The sight that you
see is the entrance, and the exit, and the transformation
Treatise on Instruments and Furnaces (French trans... Those who seek to obtain the art (or moral perfeclation)
tion) enter here, and become spirits by escaping from the
The Visions of Zosimos (English translation)
bodywhich can be regarded as human distillation; just
as how distilled water puries it, distilling the body puries it as well. He then sees a Brazen Man (another ho- The complete (as of 1888) "uvres de Zosime were
munculus, as Jung believed any man described as being published in French by M. Berthelot in Les alchimistes
metal is perceived as being a homunculus), a Leaden Man grecs. English translations remain elusive.
6.2
Arabic works
See also
Alchemy and chemistry in medieval Islam
Mary the Jewess
References
6
6.1
Bibliography
Fragments
Berthelot,
Marcelin
(1888).
Collection des Anciens Alchimistes
Grecs (in French). Paris: Steinheil.
3
Vol. I (introduction) p. 119, 127
174, 209, 250; vol. II (Greek text)
p. 28, 117120; Vol. III (trans.)
p. 117242.
H. D. Sarey & Zosime de Panopolis (trans. M. Mertens). Les
alchimistes grecs, vol. IV.1: Mmoires authentiques (in French).
Les Belles-Lettres. pp. CLXXIII
348. ISBN 2-251-00448-3. p. 1
49: I = Sur la lettre omga; V =
Sur l'eau divine; VI = Diagramme
(ouroboros); VII = Sur les appareils
et fourneaux
6.3 Studies
Abt, Theodor (2011). Introduction to the Facsilmie Edition, Introduction to the Translation, in Zosimos of Panapolis; Theodor Abt
(ed.), The Book of pictures. Mushaf
as-suwar by Zosimos of Panapolis. Edited with an introduction by
Theodor Abt. Translated by Salwa
Fuad and Theodor Abt. Corpus Alchemicum Arabicum (CALA) II.2.
Zurich: Living Human Heritage
Publications. ISBN 3-9522608-78. p. 17-139.
Berthelot, Marcelin (1885). Les
Origines de l'alchimie (in French).
Paris: Steinheil. pp. 177187.
Berthelot, Marcelin (1888). Collection des Anciens Alchimistes Grecs
6 BIBLIOGRAPHY
(in French). Paris: Steinheil. Vol.
I (introduction) p. 119, 127174,
209, 250.
Berthelot, Marcelin (1893). La
Chimie au Moyen ge (in French).
Paris: Steinheil. Vol. II, p. 203
266; Vol. III, p. 28, 30, 41.
Mead, G.R.S (1906). Zosimus on
the Anthropos-Doctrine. Thrice
Greatest Hermes: Studies in Hellenistic Theosophy and Gnosis. III.
London and Benares: The Theosophical Publishing Society. pp.
273284.
Jung, C. G. (1943). Psychology and
Alchemy.
Lindsay, Jack (1970). The Origins of Alchemy in Graeco-Roman
Egypt. ISBN 0-389-01006-5.
Jackson, A. H. (1978). Zosimos
of Panopolis. On the letter Omega.
Missoula (Montana).
Knipe, Sergio, Sacrice and selftransformation in the alchemical
writings of Zosimus of Panopolis,
in Christopher Kelly, Richard
Flower, Michael Stuart Williams
(ds), Unclassical Traditions. Vol.
II: Perspectives from East and West
in Late Antiquity (Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, 2011)
(Cambridge Classical Journal,
Supplemental Volume 35), 59-69.
7.1
Text
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7.2
Images
File:Zosimos_distillation_equipment.jpg Source:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Zosimos_distillation_
equipment.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Illustration from the 15th century Byzantine Greek manuscript, Parisinus graces,
as reproduced in, Collection des anciens alchimistes grecs (3 vol., Paris, 18871888, p.161) Original artist: Unknown Byzantine Greek
illustrator, reproduced by Marcelin Berthelot in his 1887 text, Collection des anciens alchimistes grecs
7.3
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