Alchemy - BASIL VALENTIN. The Twelve Keys of Philosophy.... Lot 16

Alchemy - BASIL VALENTIN. The Twelve Keys of Philosophy. Traicting the true Metalic Medicine. Plus l'Azoth, or the means of making the hidden Gold of the Philosophers. French translation. Paris, Pierre Moët, 1660. 2 parts in one vol. in-12 of [1] f.-176 pp. 1 engraved figure out of text and 1 gr. fig. in-t. (lacking the frontispiece and 11 out-of-text figures) ; 196 pp. 14 gr. figs. in-t. Bound in the following pages: Traicté de la nature de l'Œuf des Philosophes. Composed by Bernard, Count of Treves, German. Paris, sn, 1669. In-12 of 64 pp. Brown calf, spine ribbed and decorated (contemporary binding). The out-of-text figures of the first part are missing in most copies. Very rare and beautiful alchemical treatises. The translation of the whole is due to David L'Agneau, the author of the Harmonie Mystique. "BASIL VALENTINE. Famous Adept whose personality is uncertain. He is believed to be a Benedictine monk from one of the convents of Erfurth, in Prussia, and living in the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries. He says in his works that he was born in Alsace, on the banks of the Rhine, and that he travelled in England, Holland and Spain. His manuscripts were, it is said, found in the Church of Erfurth, after a thunderbolt had broken a column. He was the first to use antimony as a medicine. We do not know if it was he who, through dangerous experiments in a convent, gave or caused to be given, to this metal the name which has remained: "Anti-Moine. "" Caillet. "Extremely rare work, especially when followed by the treatise on Azoth, and especially the Treatise on the Egg of the Philosophers" Guaita. Worn spines and corners. Mottling and light soiling in places, small paper loss in the margin of the out-of-text plate without affecting the engraving. (Caillet 800; Guaita 2182; Dorbon 5029.)