Basil Valentine's Biography(Books)(Photos)

Basilius Valentinus, also known under the Anglicized version
of his name, Basil Valentine, was a 15th-century alchemist,

inquiries into the properties of metals and his search for
the philosopher's stone, he busied himself with the nature

who has become a legend in the history of science, lived and
worked in a German monastery. Basil Valentine was the Canon

of drugs, vegetable and mineral, and with their action as
remedies for disease. He was no anatomist, no physiologist,

of the Benedictine Priory of Sankt Peter in Erfurt, Germany.
Even his name cannot be corroborated; during the 18th

but rather what nowadays we should call a pharmacologist. He
did not care for the problem of the body, all lie sought to

century it was suggested that he was Johann Tholde. The year
given for his birth in Mainz, 1394, is also uncertain.

understand was how the constituents of the soil and of
plants might he treated so as to be available for healing

Valentine showed that ammonia could be obtained by the

the sick and how they produced their effects. We apparently
owe to him the introduction of many chemical substances, for

action of alkalies on sal-ammoniac, and how hydrochloric
acid could be produced from acidizing brine.

instance of hydrochloric acid, which he prepared from oil
and vitriol of salt, and of many vegetable drugs. And lie

Basil Valentine according to the best historical traditions,

was apparently the author of certain conceptions which, as
we shall see, played an important part in the development.

was a Benedictine monk. The name Basil Valentine may only
have been a pseudonym, for it has been impossible to trace

of chemistry and of physiology. To him, it seems, we owe the
idea of the three elements,' as they were and have been

it among the records of the monasteries of the time. That
the writer was a monk, however, there seems to be no room

called, replacing the old idea of the ancients of the four
elements—earth, air, fire, and water. It. must be

for doubt, for his writings give abundant evidence of it,
and, besides, in printed form they began to have their vogue

remembered, however, that both in the ancient and the new
idea the word element was not intended to mean that which it

at a time when there was lithe likelihood of their being
attributed to a monastic source, unless an indubitable

means to us now, a fundamental unit of matter, but a general
quality or property of matter. The three elements of

tradition connected them with some monastery.

Valentine were; (1) sulphur, or that which is combustible,
which is changed or destroyed, or which at all events

This Basil Valentine (to accept the only name we have) did
so much for the science of the composition of substances

disappears during burning or combustion ; (2) mercury, that
which temporarily disappears during burning or combustion,

that lie eminently deserves the designation that has been
given him of the last of the alchemists and the first of the

which is dissociated in the burning from the body burnt, but
which may be recovered, that is to say, that which is

chemists. There is practically a universal recognition of
the fact now that he deserves also the title of the Founder

volatile, and (3) salt, that which is fixed, the residue or
ash which remains after burning."

of Pharmaceutieal Chemistry, not only because of the value
of the observations contained in his writings, but also

Most famous works (in Latin)

because of the fact that they proved so suggestive to
certain scientific geniuses during the century succeeding

* Currus Triumphalis Antimonii (The triumphal chariot of

Valentine's life. Almost more than to have added to the
precious heritage of knowledge for mankind, it is a boon for

antimony)
* Duodecim Claves philosophic? (The twelve philosophical

a scientific observer to have awakened the spirit of
observation in others, and to be the founder of a new school

keys)

of thought. This Basil Valentine undoubtedly did, and, in
the Renaissance, the incentive from his writings for such

Many other works (in Latin and German)

men as Paracelsus is easy to appreciate.

* Porta sophica
* The Medicine of Metals

Besides, his work furnishes evidence that the investigating
spirit was abroad just when it is usually supposed not to

* Of things natural and supernatural
* Of the first tincture, root and spirit of metals

have been, for the Thuringian monk surely did not do all his
investigation alone, but must have owed, as well as given,

* De microcosmo deque magno mundi mysterio, et medicina
hominis, (Of the microcosm, of the great secrecy of the

many a suggestion to his contemporaries.

world, and the human medicine)
* Libri quattuor de particularibus septem planetarum,

Some ten years ago, when Sir Michael Foster, professor of
physiology in the University of Cambridge, England, was

(Book four: Of the features of the seven planets)
* Experimenta chymica

invited to deliver the Lane Lectures at the Cooper Medical
College in San Francisco, lie took for his subject " The

History of Physiology." In the course of his lecture on "
The Rise of Chemical Physiology " lie began with the name of

* Compendium veritatis philosophicum (German)
* Last will and testament

Basil Valentine, who first attracted men's attention to the
many chemical substances around them that might be used in

Valentinus had connections to the esoteric Freemasonry as

the treatment of disease, and said of him:

his work Azoth proves (va05, rebis with the freemasonry
square and compasses in the hands). Behind his works stood