The Language of Birds: Alchemical Symbolism Part 1
👋 If you’re new here, I’m Eve Harms, fiction writer of horror, bizarro, and exploitation tales. Mostly recently I co-wrote CHASERS, a horrific and powerful splatterpunk thriller about a trans woman discovering a peephole in her new apartment. It’s available wherever books are sold.
I also make zines, apps, and other precious and useful things. This newsletter is where I share my thoughts on art, creativity, and my many other esoteric interests.
Alchemists are best known for being protoscientific mad-men who mixed concoctions of chemicals, including the poisonous mercury, to create an elixir of immortality—and sometimes killing themselves in the process. But that common conception is misleading and only a small part of the story. What alchemists really are is much more interesting (and I use the word "are" because modern alchemists exist). Alchemist always strive to create the "philosopher's stone", but that term doesn't only refer to the elixir of immortality or turning lead into gold, it represented any goal the alchemists wanted to achieve—in the physical world or metaphysical world.
There are two types of alchemy, that sometimes intertwine: chemistry-like experiments and spiritual and personal development. Some say that even in antiquity all of the chemistry and instrumentation talk was merely a way of cloaking the true meanings and instructions of the metaphysical alchemy. And while this is likely untrue, you can see why they came to this conclusion, as alchemy is entrenched in symbolism that is featured prominently in one of it's most important aspects: the fantastic art and diagrams alchemists use to cryptically communicate their ideas.
For this series of articles, I'll be highlighting the different stages of alchemy and the symbolism associated with it. There are different ways to break up the alchemical process, but I'll be using the stages Paul Cowlan describes:
Nigredo - The Black Stage
Sub-stage: The Peacock - The Rainbow Stage
Albedo - The White Stage
Citrinitas - The Yellow Stage
Rubedo - The Red Stage
Achievement of the Goal: The Philosopher's Stone
I'll get into the symbolism related to the different stages in later parts of this series, for now I'll show two overarching symbols used in alchemical art. Alchemical symbolism is not set in stone, as there was no official hierarchy of alchemists, and the elements don\'t always mean exactly the same thing. But there are general themes. The symbols come from mythology, dreams, and the subconscious.
The Ouroboros
The ouroboros, most commonly represented as a snake eating its own tail, is a symbol you're probably familiar with. The symbol originated in ancient Egypt and represents the cycle of life, death, and rebirth as well as infinity and wholeness. In alchemical art, it can represent a few additional things:
The entire process the alchemist performs (the Magnus Opus), from the Nigredo stage to the Rubedo stage.
The Prima materia: the materials the alchemist is working with, whether it be their own persona or physical materials like chemicals
The Philosophers Stone: the outcome
When a dragon is used instead of a snake in the ouroboros, this indicated that it represents the prima materia, same as dragons appearing in a non-tail biting way.
The Seed of Order in Chaos
You'll find images similar to the one above in many alchemical manuscripts. The dark swirling clouds represent chaos, and the circle in the middle is the seed of order. As a whole, the image represents the potential and story of the alchemical process. Out of chaos, darkness and disorder, order and harmony can be extracted. It also demonstrates an important principle in alchemy: the philosopher's stone (goal) is already present in the prima materia (physical or metaphysical materials), it just needs to be brought out through the alchemical process.
That's it for part 1 of this series. In part 2 we'll explore the symbolism around the first stage of the alchemical process, the Nigredo or Black Stage.