From the book
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Heinrich Khunrath · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordThe colophon distinguishes production from availability: the book was printed at Magdeburg by Johann Bötcher in 1599 and was to be had from Johann Francke.
- In KhunrathThe short closing statement supplies concrete bibliographical information after a long work that withholds the common name of its central substance.
- In this editionUse the modern English headword forms Johann Bötcher and Johann Francke, while retaining the primary abbreviations and inflected forms in the index.
- A reading distinctionThe final collation and note 1599 p. 187 · note 248 establish the adopted leaf order.
Meaning
The colophon distinguishes production from availability: the book was printed at Magdeburg by Johann Bötcher in 1599 and was to be had from Johann Francke. The source uses separate clauses for the printer and the seller. The two names should not be treated as alternative attributions of the same printing role.
Use in the book
The short closing statement supplies concrete bibliographical information after a long work that withholds the common name of its central substance. Its ordinary trade language is valuable precisely because it is not part of the alchemical concealment. Nothing in the wording makes Francke the author, identifies a patron, or establishes a relationship beyond the book's stated availability from him.
The printer's name is broken across lines as Böt- and cher. The supplied editor uses this clearer occurrence to correct earlier readings of the title-page as Böcher. The lexicon should preserve Bötcher as the edition's settled transcription without claiming an independent inspection of the types. Likewise the date in Roman numerals is explicit, whereas the book's wider publication history would require evidence outside this colophon.
The edition also describes printer's fleurons and a grotesque mask in strapwork. These visual descriptions are modern supplied prose, even where presented alongside the German. The described tailpiece carries no shield, blazon or monogram; it should not be promoted into an identified printer's device or an encoded authorial emblem. That caution distinguishes it from the preceding owl motto, which speaks directly to the argument about seeing.
According to the supplied final collation, the colophon stands on the verso of the final unnumbered leaf, whose recto carries the owl emblem. It follows the Errata page on the verso of the p. 187 leaf. Keeping pages and leaves distinct avoids creating an additional colophon leaf not described by the edition.
Places to read
- ColophonThe print place, printer, year and separate seller are explicitly named
- EmblemThe preceding recto’s motto belongs to the authorial argument rather than the trade statement
- 1599 p. 187The dated subscription precedes the three unnumbered closing pages
Translation in this edition
Use the modern English headword forms Johann Bötcher and Johann Francke, while retaining the primary abbreviations and inflected forms in the index. The supplied text's descriptions of ornaments are editorial descriptions, not words printed by Khunrath as part of the colophon. No unverified biography of either tradesman is needed.
Source note
The final collation and note 1599 p. 187 · note 248 establish the adopted leaf order. Note Emblem · note 251 still says “colophon leaf,” a looser or inconsistent description that should not override that explicit sequence.