Chymists and chymistry: studies in the history of alchemy and early modern chemistry

Lawrence M Principe (ed.), Chymists and chymistry: studies in the history of alchemy and early modern chemistry, Philadelphia, Chemical Heritage Foundation and Sagamore Beach, MA, Science History Publications/ USA, 2007, pp. xiii, 274, $45.00 (hardback 978-0-88135-396-9).

This collection of twenty-two essays is based upon a conference held at the Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia in July 2006, an event featured in the New York Times. It covers medieval alchemy to mideighteenth century metallurgy, a discipline classified as "chymistry". "Chymistry" is consciously used by Lawrence Principe to assert that it is an anachronism to make clear distinctions between alchemy and chemistry in this period. For instance, early modern "chymists" attempted to transmute metals into gold, considered an "alchemical" practice, yet additionally performed experiments involving mass balance or crystallographic analysis that today would be considered "chemical".

As Stephen Clucas notes in his essay, it is also not so simple to cite early modem discontent (such as that of Robert Boyle in his Sceptical chymist) with alchemy's obscure language and secretive practice as an explanation for alchemy's decline and the rise of exact experimentalism. As an example, because the French chymist Samuel Duelos was...