IV · Acids, Salts & Minerals

Royal water: a 1:3 nitric–hydrochloric menstruum that dissolves gold and platinum, marked by the glyph 🜆.

Aqua vitae, or spirit of wine, is the medieval and Renaissance name for distilled aqueous ethanol, the volatile quintessence of wine.

Orpiment (arsenicum) is the golden arsenic sulfide and metalloid tied to Mercurius Duplex and the albedo.

Bismuth (Wismut; Bi) is the brittle fusible metal whose sign 🜾 named Tectum Argenti, the mineral roof over silver.

Scarlet mercury(II) sulfide (HgS), ore of quicksilver and the historic vermilion of chymical Rubedo.

Platinum, or white gold, is the silver-white metal Pt, represented here by a conjunctive solar-lunar glyph and chymical symbolism.

Antimony (Stibium) is the metalloid Sb, chiefly stibnite, hailed as Lupus metallorum for devouring and purifying metals.

Vitriol denotes the metal sulfates, chiefly green iron vitriol, and the acid oil linked to the Green Lion.