From the book
The Golden Chain of Homer
Anonymous (traditionally attributed to Anton Joseph Kirchweger) · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordSulphur can name familiar burning material, a principle, or a mineral degree.
- In the Golden ChainIts breadth connects nitre, corrosive acid, oily matter, and fixed tincture.
- TranslationYellow burning sulphur must be distinguished from universal sulphur.
- A place to readB1C23S041–042: the warning against literalizing traditional principles.
Meaning
Sulphur is one of the traditional three principles, but the author refuses to identify that principle everywhere with ordinary yellow burning sulphur. Its sign may designate corresponding portions of animal or vegetable subjects where that familiar mineral substance is not found. The same distinction separates universal mercury from quicksilver and universal salt from common table salt (B1C23S041–042).
In mineral generation sulphur is a stage between vitriolic Gur and arsenic. It arises as acid accumulates and the earthy matter becomes more fiery and fusible; further drying and fixation produce a non-burning yet still volatile arsenical condition. Thus “sulphur” is both a material name and a position in a genealogy of altered saline earth (B1C15S003; B1C23S011–012; B1C23S033).
Use in the book
The author relates sulphurous inflammability to nitre, which he treats as the source of ignition throughout nature. Oily and resinous animal or vegetable matter and mineral sulphur, naphtha, and petroleum consequently share a nitrous ancestry in his system. He also insists that mineral sulphur is corrosive, appealing to its offensive effects and to its relation with spirit and oil of vitriol. These are the text’s historical explanations and should not be read as precise modern chemical identities (B1C15S001–005; B1C23S025).
Fixed sulphur extends the word still further. In the defence of charcoal, the black residual body contains an embryonic sulphur or fixed tincture that practitioners wrongly discard. Ash is described as a still more fixed animal or vegetable sulphur. The continuum from acid to oil to charcoal and ash shows that loss of ordinary combustibility does not necessarily end every use of the name. The author is describing a preserving or colouring essential portion through changing degrees (B2C05S057–059; B2C05S068).
His critique of medicinal extracts turns upon the same breadth. A coloured sulphur drawn from a metal is only a subtilized part, not the whole perfected body. He opposes extracting the soul while calling the residue dregs, and demands a transformation retaining body with spirit. Conversely common processed sulphur may have lost generative portions and require restoration to return toward first matter. These arguments distinguish a principle, an extract, a commercial substance, and a whole mineral subject without making any one of them sufficient by name alone (B2C09S013–014; B2C10S023–026).
Places to read
- Book I · Ch. 15 · §1Sulphurous inflammability is placed within the historical nitre theory.
- Book I · Ch. 23 · §33Sulphur’s place between Gur and arsenic is specified.
- Book I · Ch. 23 · §42The sulphur principle is distinguished from yellow burning sulphur.
- Book II · Ch. 5 · §57Charcoal retains embryonic sulphur and fixed tincture.
- Book II · Ch. 10 · §24Extracted sulphur is only a part of the desired mineral transformation.
Translation in this edition
Sulphur and Schwefel occur together in the technical register. Qualifiers such as fixed, volatile, embryonic, mineral, solar, and vegetable are substantial: dropping them falsely narrows or widens the claim. “Sulphur of the Sun” may name an asserted extract or colouring principle associated with gold, and the author himself challenges what such a name proves. The retained English spelling marks a historical vocabulary whose local referent must be established each time (B2C05S063–066; B2C10S023).