Theatrum Chemicum - History

History

Theatrum Chemicum developed as an evolution of previous alchemical printing projects dating back as early as 1475, when a handful of writings believed to have been written by Geber (or pseudo-Geber) were printed with attached alchemical poems and circulated in the area of Venice, and then a decade later in Rome.

A more directly related ancestor of Theatrum Chemicum was a publication by Johannes Petreius entitled "De Alchemia", a work which contained ten alchemical tracts, which was published in Nuremberg in 1541. Petreius had been collecting alchemical documents with the intention of publishing a more complete compilation, though he never completed this task. Upon Petreius's death his collection came into the possession of his relative, Heinrich Petri of Basel who published it in cooperation with Pietro Perna in 1561. By this time the collection had accrued a total of 53 texts and was published under the name, Verae alchemiae artisque metallicae, citra aenigmata, doctrina. Though Petri would continue to publish alchemical works, it was his partner Perna who in 1572 published an entire series of expanded publications totaling seven volumes with over 80 texts. Perna intended to include the collection of his son-in-law, Konrad Waldkirch, in an even larger multi-volume series, but instead sold the collection to Lazarus Zetzner. Zetzner would publish the newly acquired 80 texts and those of Waldkirch as the first volumes of Theatrum Chemicum. Over the course of the six volumes of Theatrum Chemicum, Zetzner expanded the collection to include over 200 alchemical tracts.