Encryption Methods of the Alchemists

Hey dear Hive friends, first of all I would like to wish you all a pleasant day and hope you are doing well and you were able to have positive experiences! In this post, I would like to talk about alchemy and hope you can learn something new.

Recently I have already discussed cryptography and if you want to learn more, I can recommend this post here where I have already discussed the history. The old alchemists were also known for communicating in encrypted form and I would like to go into this in more detail in this post and have created some works of art with the help of artificial intelligence to illustrate the whole thing more. The teaching of the alchemists was full of hidden topics and not without reason they used symbolism for protection so that the knowledge did not fall into the wrong hands and was only passed on to the right ones and different techniques were used to hide the knowledge. One of the oldest of their methods was probably the hermetic tablet of Hermes on which cryptic messages could be found and this tablet was supposed to contain the knowledge of humanity and another important method was communication via illustrations. A well-known example of this is probably the Uroborus, which is a snake that bites itself in the tail and is symbolic of immortality as well as the principle of transformation or the illustration Opus Medico Chymicum from the 17th century which is supposed to represent the teaching of the four elements. Presumably, the first alchemical illustrations already appeared in ancient Egypt and often mythology was also associated with alchemy and gods or legends were linked to alchemical processes. Art was also an important method of encryption and the traces and symbolism of alchemy can be found in pretty much all known art epochs and in addition, the alchemists have designed their own alphabet with different symbols, which of course simplified communication and also various astrological and geometric symbols were of great importance.

The alchemists were also known for using animals or mythical creatures as a symbol and a well-known example of this is the phoenix which describes the transformation of base metals in gold or the green lion which stands for vitriol which was of great importance for many processes. The eagle also symbolizes the conversion of base metals into noble metals such as gold or silver and often you can also find the black raven or the white swan and various alchemical processes have also been associated with zodiac signs. An important method about communication was also the encryption via texts and here there were different methods and an important one was to rewrite texts to mislead the reader or to change the actual meanings. In recipes, for example, the required substances were renamed and in this way you could make people unsafe and consciously lead to a wrong direction. Secret inks were also used which could only decipher those who knew them and often secret characters or codes were integrated into the texts which were only understandable for some who were initiated. It is probably also interesting that with certain methods, texts were written on paper or other objects that were made visible with the help of heat or cold and hidden messages were also used in poems or other works and many other different methods existed.

Thanks for taking the time to read through my post and I hope you like it and can learn something new about alchemy!