From the book
A Chymical Dictionary
Gerhard Dorn and John French · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordDissolution of a coagulated body in a cold setting.
- In the bookGrilla describes vitriol dissolved of its own accord into water.
- A place to readThe historical definition below, 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 19; facsimile PDF page 347.
Historical definition
Deliquium is a cold descent: coagulated bodies are dissolved into a liquid in a cold place.
Meaning
Coldness distinguishes this description from melting through fire. The starting subject is a coagulated body, and the reported result is a liquid. “Descent” is retained because it is part of the historical classification; the entry does not explain a universal physical mechanism by which the change occurs.
Read the definition as an account of a condition and a transformation, rather than as a list of materials that necessarily undergo it. The word “coagulated” also carries the dictionary’s broad language of forming a body, rather than a single modern biological sense.
Use in the book
Grilla describes vitriol dissolved of its own accord into water. Gravus concerns a stone used like marble to dissolve things in the cold. Colliquation and Fusio instead describe melting. These comparisons show why simply translating every operation as liquefaction would lose distinctions the compiler makes.
Places to read
- DeliquiumRead the complete historical definition and its commentary.
- ColliquationMelting understood through the example of metals.
- FusioAn operation defined by melting and flow in fire.
- GravusA stone identified through a name and a use in cold dissolution.
In this edition
The definition supplies no temperature, duration or preparation. The edition keeps the contrast between cold dissolution and melting without converting the short gloss into an experimental instruction.
Source note
Historical source. 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 19; facsimile PDF page 347 — Facsimile