Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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There are also the many books among which Mrs. Secretiveness [Frau Heimligkeit]* sits, including the Herbarium she leans on (a book on herbs, or possibly a book of pressed, dried herbs) - the windows are shuttered and the chest (thoh, azot) and the cabinet [Ladanus] are also padlocked - she sits in silence on her chest of secrets (but she does have the key!)

On her cabinet (ladanus) and chest (thoh, azot) :
Ladanus.jpg Ladanus.jpg Viewed 34624 times 55.22 KiB

SteveM

* I am guessing that Heimligkeit is a form of heimlich 'secret, undercover', as inthe German proverb Lieber heimlich schlau als unheimlich doof - better clever in secret than incredibly stupid : [punning on heimlich/secret and unheimlich/ever so] with suffix -keit (another form of -heit) as english suffix -ness

But Vitali calls her Faith [and writes that her mouth is padlocked because faith does not need to speak]

According to an early 18th century dictionary [Wörter-Büchlein, Riga, 1705] Heimligkeit is a low german synonym of Abtriit (privy, exit, departure)
Google translates is variously according to context as 'stealth' or 'stupid'

I don't know --- maybe Huck could clarify?
Last edited by SteveM on 31 Dec 2017, 23:03, edited 18 times in total.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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"Heimligkeit" is surely just an old spelling of "heimlichkeit", secrecy (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Heimlichkeit). So the title above the picture is "The eternal secrecy speaks".

That chart you posted is interesting; where does it come from? And what does "Thoh" mean there? I would guess from the words near it that sulphur is meant rather than mercury, and that "ladanus" is associated with salt. But mercury is conspicuous by its absence. So more context might help.

I do not see how she could be "faith" in an alchemical context. What is interesting is her parallels with the Popess. She surely was associated with Faith or "the Faith" by many in the 16th century, as people like Ross, Marco, and Andrea have argued, but I would argue that this does not exhaust her meaning. (What defines the Popess is that she is the female Pope, a person who does not literally exist. The rest is interpretation by association.) To associate the alchemical figure with the Popess is not to identify her (the alchemical figure) with the Christian Faith. She also has the attributes of Isis.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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I found a recent scholarly article that discusses the image in Quinta Essentia, "Art and Artisanship in Early Modern Alchemy" by Bruce T. Moran, Getty Research Journal, No. 5 (2013), pp. 1-14, https://docslide.com.br/documents/art-a ... chemy.html. I quote one long paragraph, which first discusses the image and then what the work consists of. I highlight the part on "Thoh". Moran says, pp. 9-11:
In an image accompanying the first section of the Quinta Essentia of 1570 (fig. 6), called "Eternal Secrecy Speaks," a crowned female figure within a nimbus sits, with lips sealed by a lock, upon a locked chest labeled Thoh (that is, Thoth, the ancient Egyptian god of healing, who, with his ancient counterpart Hermes, possessed secret chemical knowledge of nature). In the 1574 woodblock illustration of the same image (fig. 7), the lock on the chest appears to be labeled Azot (usually a reference to a universal medicine or solvent, understood as the alchemical agent of material transformation). Unlocking

Fig. 6. Image of Secrecy. From Leonhard Thurneisser, Quinta Essentia (Münster, 1570), n.p. Courtesy National Library of Medicine, History of Medicine Division.

10
Fig. 7. Image of Secrecy. From Leonhard Thurneisser, Quinta Essentia (Leipzig, 1574), 26. Los Angeles, Getty Research Institute (2871-095).

11
Azot would seemingly allow access to what the chest contained. The female figure is most likely Secrecy, and as she sits surrounded by closed books, she leans upon one in particular, titled Herbarium, also locked, which may represent Thurneisser's particular interest in the powers hidden within plants and possibly refers also to the book that he even then planned to write. Other volumes nearby refer to books of nature, sacred texts, and books of secrets, some of them well-known texts within Paracelsian and alchemical traditions. In the 1570 copper plate, a massive latch and lock, possibly ready to be used but at the moment detached from anything to which they might prevent access, lie at the figure's feet. How does one gain entrance into the places that Secrecy has secured and to which she holds the key? For Thurneisser, the philosophy of Paracelsus offered one means, but experience derived from the practical skills of the artisan offered another. This is a standard view in the Paracelsian tradition, in which learning takes place not by glossing ancient texts but by means of the "light of nature," that is, by direct experience of the workings of the world. Thurneisser seems to go further, suggesting that the active manipulation of nature is essential to forcing open its sheltered spaces. Through active encounters with the material world, practice learns to be creative. "For God has brought forth everything made of Mercury, Sulfur, and Salt. Thus it is possible that there maybe made an artificial thing that in appearance is comparable to what is natural in its color, substance, and weight. . . . And solely by doing himself also what nature does, one can extract entirely from fruits, flowers, leaves, thick roots, the humors and salts of all the herbs, [as well as] their oils, essences, powers, and virtues." 20 Without the true assistance of alchemical artistry, Thurneisser declared, spirits could not be separated from bodies, nor could sulfurs be separated from salts. Turbith 21 could not be extracted from coarse metallic bodies, nor could mercury be drawn from oils. 22 Alchemy and medicine depended upon each other, and the key to unlocking the powers and subtleties of nature, by means of which potent medicines could be made, was the key of alchemical agency. That key was, in 1583, applied to specific procedures of the laboratory in Thurneisser's Magna Alchymia. 23 Its title page, attributed to the well-known German artist Jost Amman (1539~91) 24, emphasized theory and practice in extracting the subtleties of nature, fixing them, and then, by means of human manipulation (menschlichen Handgriff), transmuting them into useful salts, oils, waters, and other things for "the use and well-being of the temporal life of mankind" (fig. 8).
_____________
20. Leonhard Thurneisser, Quinta Essentia (Leipzig, 1574), 29.
21. That is, Turpetum minerale, a vitriolated mercury used as a remedy for a variety of diseases, including syphilis.
22. Thurneisser, preface to Quinta Essentia, unpaged.
23. Magna Alchymia . . . (Berlin: Nicolaum Voltzen, 1583). The Getty copy is the 1587 edition (Cologne: Johannem Gymnicum / Im Einhorn).
24. Giulia Bartrum and Marjolein Leesberg, eds., The New Hollstein German Engravings , Etchings, and Woodcuts, 1400-1700: Jost Amman; Book Illustrations, compiled by Gero Seelig (Rotterdam: Sound & Vision, 2002-3), 120-21. The title page is one of several Amman illustrations in Thurneisser's books.
Moran's figures 6, 7, etc., can be viewed in the JSTOR pdf of the article. I accessed it to see whether his figure 7 has both "Thoh" and "Azot", and where the "Thoh" by itself is on the chest of the 1570 version. His figure 7 is the same as the one I posted and linked to, of 1574. I do not know if "Azot" is the label for the lock: both are on the chest, but "Azot" is indeed next to the lock. But it seems to me that "Azot" is a form of Mercury, and thus merely "Thoh" in a different language. [added later: for a more nuanced view, see SteveM later in this thread.] In his figure 6, the 1570 version, "Thoh" is where "Thoh" is in the image I posted. The "Azot", however, is missing.
Last edited by mikeh on 03 Jan 2018, 13:42, edited 2 times in total.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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mikeh wrote: 01 Jan 2018, 06:29 But it seems to me that "Azot" is a form of Mercury, and thus merely "Thoh" in a different language. In his figure 6, the 1570 version, "Thoh" is where "Thoh" is in the image I posted. The "Azot", however, is missing.
According to Valentine it signifies "Mercurial water" and is a word devised from the first and last letters of the latin, greek and hebrew alphabet (and thus representing the beginning and completion of a process, the transformation of prima materia into ultima materia)

A-Z --- Az
Alpha to Omega --- Azo
Aleph to Tau --- Azoth

In the GD and Crowley system, Mercury the God is attributed to trump I the Magus, but mercury as a metal of the alchemists is attributed to trump II, the Priestess - Levi equated it, along with other four letter words (azoth of the alchemists, the tetragrammaton of the Hebrews, the Thot of the bohemians) with the "Taro" (Rota et al)
Last edited by SteveM on 01 Jan 2018, 14:54, edited 1 time in total.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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mikeh wrote: 01 Jan 2018, 01:31

That chart you posted is interesting; where does it come from? And what does "Thoh" mean there?
Page 198 here:

https://books.google.com.tr/books?id=ou ... &q&f=false

I presume given context that "Thoh' is a form of Thoth -- It is also a Franconian Old High Germanic form of 'da' (there, here, so, since, because) and 'obwahl' (if/either, this/that), doch and old saxon root of the English 'though', e,g,

Thoh erbarmed ef god
Uuiffher alla thia nod
Hiez her hluduigan
Tharot far ritan
=
Da erbarmet es Gott
Wusst er all die Noth
Hiess Herrn Ludwig
Dahin bald reiten

But as the text is in standard german of the time, and given the context, then no doubt Thoh=Thoth

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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Thanks. That link didn't have p. 198 where I am, but from the editor's name, Thomas Hofmeier, I was able to get it in English (or U.S.?) Google Books, at

https://books.google.com/books?id=ouIRk ... oh&f=false

The original 1574 page is also 198, at https://archive.org/stream/quintaessent ... 8/mode/1up

Given that it is at the very end of the book, I assume that this table is the secret revealed, Isis unveiled, so to speak.

Hofmeier, on the other page the link to that edition links to (editor's introduction p. xlii), draws attention to the label "Laudanus" on the (locked) cupboard, upper left of the woodcut on p. 26, which you (SteveM) also drew attention to.
https://books.google.com/books?id=ouIRk ... oh&f=false
https://archive.org/stream/quintaessent ... 6/mode/1up

He also points out the unlit candle on the shelf, next to one end of the key. and gives the book titles. Besides the Herbarium, Quinta Essentia, Misterium Aeternitatis, and the Bible (listed by Andrea at the end of http://www.letarot.it/page.aspx?id=114&lng=ENG), there are: Astronomia, Natura Rerum, Archidoxa and Mutatio.

At the beginning of this Book Twelve, I notice a double ouroboros for Luna and a single ouroboros for Sol, at
https://archive.org/stream/quintaessent ... 8/mode/1up. It seems to me that we were talking about the double ouroboros recently--I was wondering in what context they appeared-- but I can't recall where, and I can't get it to come up with the search tool here.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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mikeh wrote: 02 Jan 2018, 02:29
At the beginning of this Book Twelve, I notice a double ouroboros for Luna and a single ouroboros for Sol, at
https://archive.org/stream/quintaessent ... 8/mode/1up. It seems to me that we were talking about the double ouroboros recently--I was wondering in what context they appeared-- but I can't recall where, and I can't get it to come up with the search tool here.
Adam McLean has a few examples of the 'double ouroboros' (including Quinta Essentia) here:

http://www.alchemywebsite.com/Alchemica ... croll.html

Commonly one of the birds/dragons/serpents is winged and the other not, but in the Quinta Essentia example both appear to be winged?

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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Yes, both winged, Steve.

One other thought about "Eternal Secrecy" as the title for the achemical image, and perhaps the name of the personage shown: those two words are just a short version of the motto that Plutarch said was written on the statue of Isis at Sais: "I am all that has been, and is , and shall be [i.e. eternal], and no mortal has ever lifted my veil (or garment) [i.e. secrecy]." Thoth was Isis's teacher in magic, healing and other secrets, perhaps even her father; hence the chest labeled "Thoh", presumably containing these teachings.

Re: Egypt in the pre-Gebelin tarot

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mikeh wrote: 03 Jan 2018, 06:49
One other thought about "Eternal Secrecy" as the title for the achemical image, and perhaps the name of the personage shown: those two words are just a short version of the motto that Plutarch said was written on the statue of Isis at Sais: "I am all that has been, and is , and shall be [i.e. eternal], and no mortal has ever lifted my veil (or garment) [i.e. secrecy]." Thoth was Isis's teacher in magic, healing and other secrets, perhaps even her father; hence the chest labeled "Thoh", presumably containing these teachings.
There is another illustration with a flask on the left labelled 'ladanus' and one labelled 'Thoh' connected to a distillation jar on the the right, thus the two seem to represent products or processes? Illustrated together seems to draw a parallel between the two, which makes the connection between Thoh and Thoth weaker? Ladanus is a resin 'born of dew', or connected with a herbal product {from Ladanum}, for example in the seven books of Paulus:

Ladanum ; it is formed from the Cistus called Ladanus ;
the goats feeding upon it bring away upon their beard and
thighs the fatter and more juicy part of the herb. Ladanum,
when collected, is an excellent medicine, hot in about the
second degree, and consisting of subtile particles. It is mode-
rately emollient, discutient, and digestive ; it therefore agrees
with uterine afflictions in particular. It has also some astrin-
gency, and hence it strengthens hairs which are falling out.
cron