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 wordA subtle mobile condition through which matter rises, mixes, circulates, and can condense again.
- In the Golden ChainVapour links primordial origin, atmospheric exchange, mineral generation, and the author’s account of nourishment.
- TranslationThe English uses vapour, mist, smoke, and exhalation according to the source’s closely related descriptions.
- A place to readB1C10S001, where the upper and lower vapours thicken into regenerated chaotic water.
Meaning
Vapour is matter in a subtle, mobile, extended condition. It can rise from lower bodies, pass among regions, mingle with another vapour, and become water by thickening. In the author’s scheme, this condition bears spirit and generative power rather than signifying an empty interval between solid things. Vapour is one of the principal means by which apparent separations within nature remain materially connected.
It also bridges the perceptible and imperceptible. Smoke and mist offer visible analogies, while heavenly outflow can be entirely unseen. The shared terminology should not be converted into one modern definition of gas, aerosol, or steam. The book’s distinctions concern relative subtlety, function, and natural location.
Use in the book
B1C02S002 makes primordial water and spirit initially volatile and unstable, described as vapour, mist, and smoke-water. B1C03S003 then explains the renewed outflow of existing things through warming and sweating. What comes from above and below meets within the common exchanges of nature. In B1C06S001–B1C06S002 the vapours become suited to immediate union through movement and extension. These passages make vapour more than a transport image: its fluid and penetrable condition explains how differences can enter a common seed.
B1C10S001 identifies the thickened atmospheric result as dew, rain, snow, and related waters, which the author calls regenerated Chaos. B1C10S004 turns workshop condensation into an interpretation of heaven and air captured in watery form. The visible event and theoretical identification must be kept distinct. The text reports rising and condensed material; it infers the elemental identity and universal power from its larger account of origin and return.
B1C22S007–B1C22S008 applies the same model to animal nourishment, claiming that prepared juices are distributed by vaporization and condensation before becoming bodily members. B1C15S003 and B2C05S048 similarly make corrosive subterranean vapours attack rock, become Gur, and enter mineral development. B2C10S002 finally orders the passage of mineral vapours through plants toward animal nature. These are varied historical explanations unified by the same material possibility: what is fixed can be made subtle, conveyed elsewhere, and embodied again. Their analogy is central to the work even where their empirical claims are not modern ones.
Places to read
- Book I · Ch. 2 · §2Primordial matter is described as volatile vapour and water.
- Book I · Ch. 6 · §2Prepared vapours join readily.
- Book I · Ch. 10 · §1Atmospheric thickening regenerates common water.
- Book I · Ch. 22 · §8The author extends the model to bodily nourishment.
- Book II · Ch. 5 · §48Corrosive subterranean vapours contribute to mineral formation.
Translation in this edition
Dampff, Wasser-Dampff, Dämpffe, Dunst, Rauch, and Nebel occur in the source. Their English counterparts overlap but should not be collapsed automatically: smoke can emphasize a smoky appearance, mist a dispersed cloud, and vapour the broader mobile condition. The author often places several together to describe a continuity of subtler forms.
Volatile is a related property, not an exact synonym. A volatile portion can be liquid or even dry and coagulated when collected (B1C20S001). Vapour instead names its mobile or expanded condition in the passage under discussion. Keeping the distinction avoids treating every volatile fraction as an invisible gas at all times.