Business of Alchemy

Pamela H. Smith is the Seth Low Professor of History and Director of the Center for Science and Society at Columbia University.

• List of illustrations vii Preface to the New Paperback Edition xi Prologue Evocation 3 1 Provenances 14 2 Oeconomia rerum et verborum: Constructing a Political Space in the Holy Roman Empire 56 3 The commerce of Words: An Exchange of Credit at the Court of the Elector in Munich 93 West Indian Interlude 141 4 The Production of Things: A Transmutation at the Habsburg Court 173 Interlude in the Laboratory 228 5 Between words and Things: The Commerce of Scholars and the Promise of Ars 247 Epilogue Projection 272 Bibliography 279 Index 303

Winner of the 1995 Pfizer Most Outstanding Book Award, History of Science Society "Smith has written an incisive and intelligent study which, together with affording a wealth of fascinating archival material, provides an original and well researched overview of the rise of early capitalism and modern science. Most importantly, she has given us an insight into one of the roles of alchemy in the workings of the Holy Roman Empire in the seventeenth century."--Lyndy Abraham, Parergon "A fine study of the relation between alchemy and commerce in the German-speaking lands of the later seventeenth century... "--Simon Schaffer, London Review of Books "Spirited and fascinating... This blending of the modern with the traditional, this seamless knitting of commerce with princely extravagance, alchemy with science, commerce, and industry, stands as the major achievement of Smith's portrait of intellectual life in the late-seventeenth-century Hapsburg territories."--Margaret C. Jacob, American Historical Review "Encyclopedic and erudite, all handled with great skill, eloquence, and clarity."--William E. Painter, Religious Studies Review