Alchemy Games: An Introduction to the Medievalism of Experimentation
What alchemy is, what it isn't, and acknowledging that it's everywhere
And all the winds would cry, and many men would die
And all the waves would bow down to the Loreley
Blackmore’s Night, “Loreley”
There are a few epigraphs today to break up sections. This first one is from a song about a big rock on the Rhine. Such power over nature the alchemists sought.
I’m working on a larger scholarly project about alchemy in games, and while I write and research for that, I wanted to share some of my biggest take-aways and thoughts with you all.
In this introduction, I’ll show off some basics about alchemy, good sources for more information, and a little bit of history. Going forward, I’ll do some deep-dives into specific games.
First, some disclaimers
My expertise and where to go for more about alchemy
I’ve been studying alchemy—especially as it appears in medieval literature and religious writings—for about 5 years. I’ve been studying the ways it shows up in games for just as long. A conference presentation I gave about Skyrim in 2021 was my first step into this subsubsubfield. I was a chemistry guy in high school, so despite studying medieval literature, it in a way felt like coming home.
The study of modern media/culture that uses medieval references or ideas is called “medievalism.” This is stuff like fantasy, but it’s also the ways that far-right groups will call themselves “knights.” Robert Houghton recently coined the term “ludic medievalism” for “the study of medieval-inspired ideas in games,” so my look at alchemy in games comes from that new tradition that’s still establishing itself.
I wrote my dissertation about alchemy being used as a literary device in Middle English poetry. You can access it here for free, if you have a few open hours ahead of you and you’d like to be bored. There are a couple typos, but otherwise I think it’s pretty good. I’m not a leading expert, but I’ve read most of the best scholars in medieval alchemy. What I’m going to add is the games angle.
You should check out plenty of other sources if you want to learn more than the (very) brief info that I’ll provide in this “alchemy in games” series.
Esoterica has several videos about alchemy (here is his “start here” video, on Pseudo-Geber). The channel is run by Dr. Justin Sledge, whose work is really great. He’s an excellent place to start. His channel covers a lot of occult stuff and religious topics more generally, and he discusses the mystical side to alchemy much more than I will.
If you’re interested in primary sources, get a copy of Stanton Linden’s The Alchemy Reader. It’s a compilation of texts that discuss elemental transformation from Aristotle to Isaac Newton.
On the scholarly side, I recommend Jennifer Rampling’s 2020 book The Experimental Fire and Eoin Bentick’s 2022 book Literatures of Alchemy. These were huge influences on my dissertation. Lawrence Principe is a big name in alchemy history as well; he was recently a guest on the podcast Unexplainable for the episode called “Who are we to fight the alchemy?” He’s got a book called The Secrets of Alchemy.
To muchel folk we doon illusioun,
And borwe gold, be it a pound or two,
Or ten, or twelve, or manye sommes mo,
And make hem wenen, at the leeste weye,
That of a pound we koude make tweye.
Yet is it fals, but ay we han good hope
It for to doon, and after it we grope.
But that science is so fer us biforn,
We mowen nat, although we hadden it sworn,
It overtake, it slit awey so faste.
It wole us maken beggers atte laste.”
Whil this Yeman was thus in his talkyng,
This Chanoun drough hym neer and herde al thyng
Which this Yeman spak, for suspecioun
Of mennes speche evere hadde this Chanoun.
For Catoun seith that he that gilty is
Demeth alle thyng be spoke of hym, ywis.
Geoffrey Chaucer, “The Canon’s Yeoman’s Tale,” 673-689.
Modern English:
Yeoman: “To many folk we do delusion,
And borrow gold, be it a pound or two,
Or ten, or twelve, or many sums more,
And make them think, at the very least,
That from one pound we could make two.
Yet is it false, but always we have good hope
To do it, and after it we grope.
But that knowledge is so far beyond us,
We can not, although we had sworn it,
Overtake it, it slides away so fast.
It will make us beggars at the last.”
While this Yeoman was thus in his talking,
This Canon drew himself near and heard everything
Which this Yeoman spoke, for suspicion
Of men’s speech ever had this Canon.
For Cato says that he who is guilty
Deems all things spoken of him to be true.
For now, know this: alchemists were, in general, really trying to discover truths about physical reality. Without them, we don’t get modern chemistry. They were doing real experiments. They had their critics, but they aren’t a joke, nor were they all fools on a pointless endeavor.
Alchemists are now infamous for having written obscure and metaphorical texts, to the point where—alchemy scholars are now pretty well agreed on this—almost everyone who took up the mantle of alchemy after the 1600s entirely misunderstood what was going on. Sorry Carl Jung. It’s not about transformation of the self. It’s about metals and medicines.1
Most scholars, like Principe and Rampling above, focus on the early modern alchemists, most of their work concerning the late 1400s and after. I focus on the earlier writers, from the Arabic world and through the early 1400s in Europe. The medieval alchemists weren’t as crazy as the latter generations.
Experimentation = Gaming
Games are a really excellent medium for discussing alchemy—both are intrinsically wrapped up with experimentation, as a concept. Just as an alchemist has to try and fail and try again with new information on what not to do, so too the gamer. Most scholars I’ve referred to previously have touched on this connection between gaming and experiments: Jagoda, Chang, Juul, Ruberg.
The equivalence of games and experiments is more than metaphor. I find a lot of power and use out of thinking about games in this way. It’s helped me not get so angry when I fail a mission on a first attempt.
Alchemy’s weird metaphors and tricks
Let’s go over some concepts, just so we’re clear.
Alchemists wanted to make the elixir—from Arabic al-iksir—which could refer to either a potion that grants everlasting life or the Philosophers’ Stone. The Stone is what most of us probably think of today, no doubt in part due to Rowling’s first Harry Potter book. The Stone was not a single rock; it was a solution that the alchemist would cast upon whatever he2 wanted to turn into gold. Some alchemists believed the potion and the Stone were indeed one substance.
Alchemists were university-educated for a few centuries in Europe, until the 1300s, at which point most of this fledgling academia had dismissed it as a curiosity. Alchemy, you see, had still not worked. They just couldn’t seem to get it to work. Their materials wasted, and their trust plummeted. But for a while, it was what we would call a “science” today. Alchemists sought truth through physical experimentation.
Alchemy, as a mystical proto-science, was deeply intertwined with theology, astrology, herbal medicine, and the Aristotelian elemental theory of nature (water, earth, fire, water, aether). Each planet had its own alchemical metal by association, and these names were swapped fairly frequently to more poetically describe a laboratory process.3
My work previously focused on alchemical fraud in literature, the ways in which medieval poets criticized alchemists by calling them liars and scammers. That is, when Pope John XXII denounced alchemists in 1317,4 he didn’t command that we avoid them for fear of black magic.5 He commanded that they cease defrauding people with false promises of gold; their punishment, on being caught, was to pay as a fine the amount of true gold they had promised to produce.
Everything they say about me is true! I’m a phony! I got no powers.
The Wiz, The Wiz (1978)
When Chaucer claimed that the fiend (the word he uses for Satan, or the devil) was with the alchemists in their lab, he’s exaggerating for rhetorical effect. He didn’t think they were literally summoning Satan to assist them in altering objects to appear like gold. He was invoking the Great Falsifier so that we’d know the alchemists are liars, both morally and economically bankrupt.6
Alchemy: More metal than magic
The Alchemist: All is within my reach! The air in your lungs, the sand holding your step. The world cannot be without Me! The Light that you lived for, The Empty you died for. Where all things end, I will remain.
The World Is Quiet Here, “Heliacal Vessels II: In the Unity of the Lake”
Here is a very brief overview of alchemy’s history, from the ancient world to the medieval/modern border.
Alchemy emerges in Roman-era Egypt. Bayek of Siwa may have met a couple in Alexandria. The proto-science gained traction in the conflagration of neoplatonism, Egyptian metallurgy and ancient writings, and nascent Christian mysticism. Between 200 BCE and 200 CE, alchemy had become systematized, but its textual origins are still pretty obscure. A lot of early writings are attributed to Hermes Trismegistus (Thrice-great), a Greek name and epithet for the Egyptian god Thoth. Thoth didn’t actually write anything (I assume he was busy), but the treatises were given his name.
The first famous alchemist we have good records for is Zosimos. His work is important because he names a lot of alchemists whose works were not preserved over the centuries.
Alchemy was officially studied and brought into academic good standing during the Islamic Golden Age, between 700 and 1100 CE. Basim knew some alchemists. Altair should have, too. Jabir ibn Hayyan and ibn Sina (known in the West as Avicenna, so he was called in medieval Italy) wrote extensively about the elements, about the alchemical process, about medicine, about astrology, mathematics, new steam inventions, you name it.
In the 1100s, during what is sometimes called the “renaissance of the twelfth century,” Europeans translated Arabic texts into Latin and worked with their Muslim and Jewish colleagues to massively expand scientific efforts and philosophies in general.
In the 13th and 14th centuries, we get some big names: Michael Scot (yes this is a real dude), Albertus Magnus, and Roger Bacon among them. Scot gave up an archbishop appointment to keep studying and translating. Bacon you need to know. He significantly altered curriculum at universities across Europe, introduced empiricism (experimentation, testing, and not taking other philosophers at their word alone) into standard European scholarly practice, and was the first European to describe and record the formula for gunpowder. He was also an avid alchemist and was celebrated for it.
In the 1400s, into the early 1500s, alchemy gets weirder and more mystical. George Ripley, Paracelsus, and Agrippa are the big names here. These guys get named the most today, especially since popular imaginings of alchemy are usually based on the more mystical early modern pseudo-science. Eggers uses Agrippa as his clearest referent for the alchemist von Franz in Nosferatu (2024).
But the alchemy that I find in videogames is pretty squarely a medievalism based in experimentation with magical effects. So I end the history here.
The End (for now)
Consider yourself calcined. The first step in the alchemical process was almost always calcination, smiting a substance into a fine powder. Ritualistic death, ready for purification and eventual resurrection.
To keep this brief, I’ve cut out a large section about alchemists who actually did claim to summon demons with their craft. I’ll revise it and post it in a few days as its own thing.
And now, to end off, here is one more hopeful, to give you confidence as we go further into this subject:
The Mothers: Seldom walked, this path is laid with gold far too few have seen.
The World Is Quiet Here, “Heliacal Vessels I: The Mothers of No Kin”
Have a friend who wants to transmute themself into a subscriber? We’ve got 150. Let’s keep multiplying, that our Work may ever grow and our Sun come ever closer.
New here? Hit this button so that you get my next email. More alchemy is on the horizon, and I don’t post at a consistent time. At this point, I’m considering that part of my charm. More not-alchemy is also coming, if this isn’t your thing but you’re willing to stick it out for better pastures.
American pharmacies and British chemists both descend from alchemy’s seeking of remedies, etymologically.
Alchemy was an incredibly masculine study, even for medieval standards; a few famous legendary ancient alchemists were women, but none of the influential Islamic or Christian alchemists were. This despite women’s work often being a requirement or precursor to much of alchemical study.
For example, Mars was Iron, and Mercury was Quicksilver. To say that you were mixing some quicksilver into your mess of shattered iron on the lab table, you could write, “Y sawe Mercurrie highe comynge ouer / to mete with and conjoyne with red Venuses louer / And ypouned fyne and faste yt was” [I saw high Mercury coming over / to meet and conjoin with Venus’s red lover (i.e., Mars) / And it [the iron] was finely well pounded (into a powder)]. We still call that squirmy metal “mercury” today because of its alchemical metaphorical name. These pseudo-Middle English pentameter lines of poetry are made up mostly in the style of the Midlands dialects of the late 1300s and are not from anything specific.
Spondent quas non exhibent is the title: “They promise what they cannot show.”
“Black magic” is first attested in English in the late 16th century. They had understandings of demonic or evil magics, but these were not associated with alchemy.
Satan is the “deceiver” because of his tricking Eve in Eden in Genesis 3. This was a later tradition; if you read the text itself without that later tradition, the serpent is not “Satan” and does not lie.