A Chymical Dictionary

Aqua fecum vini

Salts solvents and liquid preparations · A Chymical Dictionary

At a Glance

The word. A liquid preparation named through the ash of wine lees.

A place to read. The historical definition below, 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 5; facsimile PDF page 333.

Historical Definition

Aqua fecum vini is made from the ashes of wine lees, dissolved on marble like oil of tartar.

Meaning

The entry gives a sequence of material transformations rather than merely another name for wine. Lees supply the starting matter; their ash is then described as dissolving on marble; oil of tartar supplies a comparison. Keeping those stages visible prevents a reader from treating the product as unchanged wine or as spirit of wine.

The comparison explains a manner or appearance of preparation without providing quantities or a complete protocol. The ash origin also connects the term with the dictionary’s broader accounts of salts and calxes. For interpretation, its relation to residue and dissolution is more informative than a modern guess based on the word Aqua alone.

Places to Read

Alcali. Salt defined through extraction from ash or calx.

Tartarum. A wine-vessel deposit whose name also serves for bodily stones or gravel.

Deliquium. Dissolution of a coagulated body in a cold setting.

Historical source: 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 5; facsimile PDF page 333 — Facsimile

Sources. A Chymicall Dictionary (1650), s.v. Aqua fecum vini ; compare Alcali, Tartarum, Deliquium

See also. Alcali; Tartarum; Deliquium