Catalogue Entry: ALCH00118
'Ex Hercule Piochymico'
Custodial History
Bought at the 1936 Sotheby sale by Emmanuel Fabius for £5.10s. Sold as Lot 507 at the New York Sotheby sale of 3 December 2004 to an unknown buyer for $42,000.
Sotheby Lot
SL29Contents
Extracts from the Hercules piochymicus of Pierre Jean Fabré, a work first published Toulouse 1624. The text also includes one citation from Fabré's Myrothecium spagyricum (Toulouse, 1628) , though in both cases Newton's transcripts are taken from his own copy of Fabré's complete works (Frankfurt am Main, 1652). Fabré's works, which Newton studied intensely, are largely devoted (like those of Michael Maier, another of Newton's favourite alchemical authors) to interpreting Greek myths - in this case that of Hercules - as allegories of alchemical processes.
Notes
Mistitled 'Hercula Piochymica' in the 1936 Sotheby catalogue. Fabré did not, as stated in the 2004 Sotheby catalogue and in almost all other references to him, die in 1650: he was still alive, though very ill, in early 1656: see John T. Young, 'Newton's Alchemical Notes in the Royal Society', Notes and Records of the Royal Society 60 (2006), 25-34, p. 28, n. 15.
Related Material
See H598 for Newton's copy of Fabré's complete works.
