The Carbuncule

[Jerry]

This subject is in serious need of re-examination.

It does appear that there is actually some physical practical work in Alchemy using only one or two substances to make the Stone. Any explanation or process that drifts away from the “one or two substance rule” would then be in error.

One of the problems is that there are three products that carry the same name, the Philosopher’s Stone. According to my dictionary the Carbuncle is defined as:

1. Garnet
2. A precious stone which has the properties of giving out light.
3. An emerald.

Alchemy is the study of definitions.

It appears that the Carbuncle is made according to: “A Red Water shining Light by Night of the Second Description of Isaacus” which is described in Weidenfeld, and it is further stated that: “This Water I have reduced to a Red Christalline Stone, which would give light by night, so as that my Friends might see to eat and drink by it”.

The Carbuncle appears to be the precursor to the Powder of Projection, Stone of Transmutation, etc., which is made from the first substance: Aurum potable or the substance(s) the Aurum potable, Universal Medicine, etc. was made from.

The practical work is:

1. First, the preliminary investigation of possible substances, processes, and conditions used in the Work which conforms to the requirements of the alchemical literature.

2. Second, the further investigation of the hypothetical substances identified above in #1 to see if they can be further processed to give the desired results (as described in the alchemical literature).

[deviadah]

This is a spin-off from this thread: Practical Alchemy - an introduction

I moved this into a topic of its own.

[BeautifulEvil]

It appears that the Carbuncle is made according to: “A Red Water shining Light by Night of the Second Description of Isaacus” which is described in Weidenfeld, and it is further stated that: “This Water I have reduced to a Red Christalline Stone, which would give light by night, so as that my Friends might see to eat and drink by it”.

Yes, this is something I've been working on lately. There are a few examples of this red water or shining stone, and all seem to have two things in common: vitriol and sal niter.

It's either exhibiting chemiluminescence, or phosphorescence. Both of which would seem like magic to the uninitiated. I'm willing to bet it's phosphorescence though, especially since it can be "charged" by the sun. Sounds rather occult to me!

Take a peak at the word phonetically. Carbunucle sounds (and looks) a lot like carbonucle. So a stone from coal or carbon? I've heard of this a few times before. An example is by calcining the residue leftover from the distillation of urine with carbon or coal. This will release elemental phosphorous. The phosphorous reacts with oxygen to shine brightly. Some of the metallic sulfate salts are reduced to metallic sulfide salts on addition of carbon, and some of these sulfide salts exhibit phosphorescence (ZnS:Cu is a quick example). It's called carbothermic reduction. Doping the ZnS with silver or gold will produce different results.

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These are procedures and notes I've extracted from Weidenfeld's "Secrets of the Adepts."

1/2lb roman vitriol (copper sulphate or a double salt of iron/coppper sulfate)
1/2lb cinnabar (mercuric sulfide)
1/2lb verdegrese (copper carbonate)
1/2lb cerusse (white lead carbonate [oxide?])
1/4lb crocus martis (red ferric oxide)
1/4lb lapis haematities (iron (II/III) oxides)
2.5lb sal niter (potassium nitrate)

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1. Pulverize and mix all together very well, as if to paint with it.
2. Divide into three parts (1.67lb each)
3. Make an aqua fortis of one part (distill all).
4. Pour the distillate from #3 onto the second third of the powder.
5. Repeat 3 & 4 with the remaining third of the powder.
6. Pulverize all three caput mortuums with the water of sal armoniack (grind it as fine as possible).
7. Then lightly dry this mass. Pulverize it, and add to an earthern pot.
8. Pour the distilled aqua fortis upon the calcined mass from step 7 then proceed to careful distillation.
9. Distill first with a gentle fier for 24 hours.
10. Increase the fire and distill for 24 hours longer.
11. Increase the fire until it begins to shine, and keep it in the same fiery brightness for 6 hours.
12. Let it cool, remove from distillation rig, and stop the receiver well.
13. Grind and pulverize the caput mortuum and extract the salt with distilled vinegar. Clarify and Purify.
14. Put the salt from #13 into a flask and pour the previously distilled aqua fortis from step 9-11 on it.
15. Lightly distill this in a sand bath on a water bath, in balneo.
16. Distill all that will distill, and when no more comes over, let it boil for a 24 hours more.
17. Let this cool, remove it from the balneo bath, and then distill with a weak fire for 12 hours.
18. Increase the fire more and distill for 12 hours in this mediocre degree of heat.
19. Increase the fire even more and distill for 6 hours in this moderate degree of heat.
20. Let it cool, remove it from the fire, cover well.
21. Repeat step 13-20 three or four times or until all the matter distills over.
22. When finished you will have a red shining water, which can be reduced into a glowing crystalline stone.

1 part purified crystalline vitriol (ferrous sulphate or copper sulphate [Roman vitriol?])
1 part sal niter (potassium nitrate)

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1. Distill an aqua fortis out of them according to art.
2. Extract salt from caput moruum with common distilled water. Purify until clarified and congeal into a powder.
3. Put the purified earth into a flask, pour the aqua fortis from #1 into the flask.
4. Repeat step 1 to 3 multiple times until all the salt has been distilled.
5. In the end we should have a red glowing water.

[Jerry]

The word carbuncle, also spelled carboncle, charboncle, charbucle, carbocle, charbuckelle, charbokull, is derived from the Latin word carbunculus which means “a little coal” (L. carbo = a coal). You could also make some association with Fulcanelli’s stone khol and amber = ember.

Phosphorus can be made from urine by various means. Perhaps one the lesser known methods is to quench molten tin or lead in urine. The metals form phosphides which when heated release elemental phosphorus. These metallic phosphides can react with moisture in the air and produce highly toxic phosphine gas but may account for Fulcanelli’s “will o’ the wisp”.

Burning phosphorus produces a brilliant white light. The slow oxidation of phosphorus, like from a solvent, produces a very dim light with the production of ozone which accounts for the peculiar odor.

Something along these lines of sulfides might be a good hypothetical. There are thousands of such phosphorescent substances which could emit light, however all these hypotheticals are going to have to conform to the literature.

One of the important considerations is the use of only one or two substances. And that the Carbuncle appears to be the progression of the Aurum potable or the Universal Medicine. If one can make a Carbuncle with two substance then one will also have to show how it could be made from one. This would indicate that if only one substance were used, it must have some degree of complexity.

Another substance of interest is Homberg’s Pyrophorus which is made “…by mixing 3 parts of alum with 2 or 3 parts of honey, flour, or sugar, and cautiously driving it, with constant agitation, in an iron pan. The mixture first melts, and dries into small pieces, which are reduced to powder, and again roasted. A portion of this powder sprinkled upon cotton causes it to take fire…” - The Story of 100 Years of Phosphorus Making, 1951.

“This Phosphorus, made either by Mr. Homberg’s or by Mr. Lemeri’s method, shines by both by day and by night. Besides emitting light, it takes fire soon after it is exposed to the air, and kindles all combustible matters with which it comes in contact: and this without being rubbed or heated.” – Principles of Chemistry (?)

Of course there could be other explanations for the Lucis occultata

[BeautifulEvil]

Jerry you're very knowledgeable on this subject.

Phosphorus can be made from urine by various means. Perhaps one the lesser known methods is to quench molten tin or lead in urine. The metals form phosphides which when heated release elemental phosphorus. These metallic phosphides can react with moisture in the air and produce highly toxic phosphine gas but may account for Fulcanelli’s “will o’ the wisp”.

Burning phosphorus produces a brilliant white light. The slow oxidation of phosphorus, like from a solvent, produces a very dim light with the production of ozone which accounts for the peculiar odor.

...

One of the important considerations is the use of only one or two substances. And that the Carbuncle appears to be the progression of the Aurum potable or the Universal Medicine. If one can make a Carbuncle with two substance then one will also have to show how it could be made from one. This would indicate that if only one substance were used, it must have some degree of complexity.

Phosphorous can be used to precipitate a very fine calx of gold from an aqua regia solution. I've read this a few times before, but I cannot recall where. I'm sure bubbling phosphine gas into gold laden aqua regia would also result in a precipitate, and it may even be better than using powdered phosphorus.

Lightly distill this phosphorus/gold laden aqua regia and you will have a glowing gold calx residue (gold+phosphorus). It might actually come out as a goop, maybe even a black gloop (if it turns out red, then all the better). Gently digest this, and it should turn white (indicating white phosphorus). Increase the heat, and it'll go yellow (indicating white phosphorus AND some red phosphorus), and then red. If you heat red phosphorus a little longer it'll turn into a red crystalline substance.

I'm not saying this is the Philosopher's Stone, or even the Carbuncle, but it does seem interesting. Keep in mind this is just personal speculation on my part.

Site:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus
Red phosphorus: here one of the bonds in P4 described above has been broken, and one additional bond is formed with a neighboring tetrahedron. Red phosphorus may be formed by heating white phosphorus to 250°C (482°F) or by exposing white phosphorus to sunlight. Phosphorus after this treatment exists as an amorphous network of atoms which reduces strain and gives greater stability; further heating results in the red phosphorus becoming crystalline. Red phosphorus does not catch fire in air at temperatures below 240°C, whereas white phosphorus ignites at about 30°C.

http://books.google.com/books?id=1AI5AAAAMAAJ&lpg=PA210&ots=CLCabCXBJv&dq=phosphorus%20precipitated%20gold%20from%20aqua%20regia&pg=PA210&ci=157,359,786,476&source=bookclip

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I think pitchblende is another interesting subject to look into. All pitchblende contains a small amount of radium, and radium has a very peculiar property of constantly giving off a dim light. I believe it produces radon gas (as a radioactive decay product) which will send zinc sulfide, or any other metallic sulfide, into a brilliant shining phosphorescence. Diamonds also go into a brilliant phosphorescence when brought near a sample of radium. There are many other interesting things about this substance, but I only have enough time to mention a few important facts. Take a look at the article here: http://www.nuenergy.org/TheWondersOfRadium.pdf (password: curie707)

[kerkring]

This is from 'Path of the Crucible' by Bartlett:

"The Golden Carbuncle of the Ancients

Rudolf Glauber describes another way of uniting vegetable
and metallic natures in his work Centuries. He mentions “the
manner of conjoining gold with any burning and volatile
vegetable sulfur” to produce a red extract which is “nearly as
good as potable gold”.

The method is fairly easy and requires only a small amount
of gold, a vegetable charcoal and his “Sal Mirabilis”.
Today, Sal Mirabilis is known as sodium sulfate, though it
still carries the common name of “Glaubers Salt”.
Glauber studied and wrote extensively regarding this salt as a
great arcanum for medicine and alchemical uses. Current
medicine considers it only as a mild laxative, but Glauber
describes it as a key to opening the mineral realm and releasing
great healing potentials.

If you want to prepare Sal Mirabilis in the old way, simply
treat sea salt with concentrated Oil of Vitriol (sulfuric acid)
using a glassware setup as shown below.

The sulfuric acid is slowly dripped onto sea salt and the
reaction produces hydrogen chloride, called “spirit of salt”, as a
gas which is bubbled into water.

Water will dissolve large volumes of hydrogen chloride, and
the resulting solution will be hydrochloric acid, which is useful
in many alchemical works so save it aside tightly sealed.

The sulfuric acid treated salt remaining in the flask has now
been converted into sodium sulfate or Sal Mirabilis. This salt is
now recrystallized from rainwater several times before use. The
salt looks like crushed ice and melts at an incredibly low
temperature of 32 deg C.

The crystals form in the orthorhombic habit and hold a large
amount of water which must be removed for our use here. Dry
the crystals at 100 deg C until they become pure white.
In this form the crystals melt at about 800 deg C. By the
way, the salt is also insoluble in alcohol and is frequently used
to dry alcohol of residual water, similar to the use of salt of
tartar.

Now that we have our starting material, we can proceed to
make what Glauber calls “The Golden Carbuncle of the
Ancients”.

For one part of gold, melt eight to ten parts of the sal
mirabilis in a crucible (parts by volume). Once it is fused,
slowly add the gold as a powder or thin leaves. Slowly add
small pieces of charcoal to the melt.

The best charcoal for this is from grape vines, but you can
use oak, cedar, juniper, beech, or boxwood also. Continue the
fusion for 15 to 30 minutes, then cast the melt out onto a hot
metal dish to cool.

The mass will have a deep red color due to the finely
divided gold. This is the “Golden Carbuncle” that “shines in
the night like a burning coal”.

Powder the mass and extract with good spirit of wine. The
extract will become deep red, with properties similar to good
potable gold. The residue from the extraction can be put
through the process again to create more of the red extract
which is a form of colloidal gold."

[BeautifulEvil]

Very interesting! I've heard some good stuff about Bartlett's new book.

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