Clangor Buccinae

Use in the book

On page 84, immediately after completing Arnold's testimony, Khunrath cites the Clangor and other authorities for the proposition that the water naturally contains the spirit of the fifth essence. That spirit alone can corrupt metals masterfully and transform them into their own first matter. The adjective naturaliter matters: the required agency is already present in the water. It is not bestowed by a performer's verbal declaration or established by an impressive appearance.

The placement prepares the ensuing polemic against catching the world-spirit from the air or firmament into materials arranged by the Artist. Khunrath replies that the spirit has already been provided for without human intervention. The Clangor therefore helps secure the contrast between receiving Nature's appointed subject and trying to manufacture its universal agency out of an arbitrary candidate. The cited corruption is also a qualified destruction leading to the return into first matter, not simply any corrosive breakdown.

The title's sounding imagery can otherwise produce a mistaken association. The trumpets on pages 25–3023456 name kinds of proof, while this trumpet is a bibliographical witness within a particular proof. A lexicon should connect the reader with the book's local proposition before adding a general history of alchemical texts bearing resonant titles.

Places to read

1. 1599 p. 84The Clangor is cited for the fifth-essence spirit naturally hidden in pri-material water and its exclusive transformative power.
2. 1599 p. 83Arnold's preceding testimony supplies the immediate context of true dissolution and return to first matter.

Translation in this edition

The modern apparatus dates the work and names a printed collection that Khunrath might have used. The 1599 passage itself supplies neither edition nor date. In particular, an available 1593 printing does not prove that it was the copy he read; this article leaves that bibliographical question open.