Alchemists at the Castle

The Castle, a city within a city, was not subject to the laws applying to the rest of Prague. Various craftsmen, but also charlatans, therefore flocked here and settled along its walls. Particularly under Emperor Rudolf II, called the new Hermes Trismegistus, there was an influx of alchemists and all manner of swindlers. Their refuge was the area below the Castle, and although it is said that alchemists never lived in the world-famous Golden Lane, the all-powerful imagination has assigned it extraordinary importance in this respect. The little houses attached to the walls were supposedly occupied mainly by goldbeaters, from whom the lane took its original name of Goldsmiths’ Lane. Legend says Rudolf II kept strict watch over the alchemists here. Each occupied one of the tiny houses, and a door locked from within meant that he was engaged in transmutations. Day and night, a mercenary carrying a halberd paced up and down the lane. One day some alchemists supposedly rebelled and demanded to take fresh air in the Deer Moat. But the moat was reserved for the emperor’s noble guests, and it was unthinkable that coarse distillers should mingle with such exalted company. The emperor refused their request. In protest, the alchemists cut off their hair, smashed their vessels, furnaces and bellows, and threw everything down into the Deer Moat onto the noble hunters’ heads. They went on strike, declaring that from then on they would not supply the imperial court with a single grain of gold. Rudolf II supposedly responded in his own fashion: he had them brought into the Deer Moat, put them in iron cages suspended from trees, and left them to perish miserably of hunger and thirst. This was a warning and a reminder of the alchemist’s sacred duty never to abandon his Great Work during its maturation. Gustav Meyrink, indeed, says outright in his novel The Angel of the West Window that the bears in the Deer Moat “lived on the flesh of initiates.” There are also two stories stemming from a Prague legend of alchemists who settled and worked in Golden Lane in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century. They supposedly even made gold, but then died tragically. One was a baron from South Bohemia; the other, a man named Uhle, had originally been a professor of philosophy. A house called At the Last Lantern is also said to stand beside the wall in Golden Lane, but can be seen only on certain nights. According to old tradition, it contains the foundation stone of invisible Prague, the “threshold” between the visible and invisible worlds. The same tradition credits the esoteric Order of the Asiatic Brethren, the Sad-bays, with creating this realm of the invisible city. Franz Kafka lived in house no. 22 in 1916, while Stanisław Przybyszewski never managed to do so, despite his strenuous efforts. Before the Second World War, the famous clairvoyant Madame de Thèbes lived at no. 4. It is verified that the court alchemical laboratories were in Mihulka Tower, where a small remnant of Rudolf II’s once-rich collection and a reconstruction of an alchemical laboratory are now displayed. Rudolfine Prague hosted perhaps all the leading alchemists of its day, with the possible exception of the Scottish adept Sethon. Many were frauds hoping to profit from imperial favour. The emperor therefore appointed the Prague scholar Tadeáš Hájek of Hájek as examiner to prevent their reaching the royal court. What magnetism Prague must have radiated then to attract such different figures as John Dee (see Třeboň), Edward Kelley (see Jílové u Prahy), Michael Sendivogius (see Kravaře), Tycho Brahe (see Benátky nad Jizerou) and Johannes Kepler (see Jičín)! The philosopher Giordano Bruno, later burned in Rome for his astronomical views, visited Rudolf II in Prague and published a book here in 1585 about the teachings of the Spanish medieval mystic and alchemist Ramon Llull. The celebrated French alchemist Denis Zachaire of Toulouse and his compatriot Nicolas Barnaud also stayed here for a time. The chemist and Paracelsian Oswald Crollius, known for his book on gemstones, visited Prague several times, though he is said to have had political espionage in mind. Two renowned alchemists served as the emperor’s personal physicians. Michel Mayer maintained extensive contacts with the Rosicrucian Brotherhood and was himself a secret member; he wrote the important Atalanta fugiens (The Fleeing Atalanta, 1618). The other, Martin Ruland, studied Paracelsus’s writings in detail and published his Alchemical Lexicon in 1612. The alchemists gathered at the Castle, whether serving the emperor, the Rosenbergs or Václav Vřesovec, were then called the “Prague alchemical academy.” The court poet Mardocheus de Delle, an Italian from Vitri near Milan, wrote his Fegefeuer (Purgatory) here, describing the fortunes of individual alchemists at the imperial court. Other masters and assistants in the art of transmutation at the Castle included Claudius Syrrus, the mathematician Bartoloměj Reisacher, Fridrich Holzschuher of Nuremberg, Bohumil Hanuš, Ambrož Zigler, Jakub Strautz, Pavel Fabricius, Remus Cysatus, Vilém Rechberger and others. Mining officials, whose positions already brought them close to precious metals, also pursued the science of Hermes. Among those who experimented were Lazar Ercker, famed for his Book of Assaying (see Kutná Hora), and Petr Hlavsa of Liboslav, removed from the office of mining mintmaster under Ferdinand I because of his excessive devotion to alchemy. So too was Šebestián Essen, who died in the White Tower at Prague Castle (see Kutná Hora). Rudolf II summoned Sebald Schwertzer, previously mining captain in Jáchymov. He later gained imperial favour in Prague and remained at court until his death in 1601. He also wrote several alchemical treatises, some of which are held in the National Museum. Among the foremost Czech alchemists active here was Šimon Tadeáš Budek, appointed by the emperor to investigate everyone coming to Bohemia in search of precious stones and metals. He wrote an extensive alchemical treatise partly in cipher, whose manuscript is now in Vienna (see Rovensko pod Troskami). Bavor the Younger Rodovský of Hustiřany (see Budyně nad Ohří) and Václav Lavin, named Vinceslas Lavinius de Moravie in the French edition of his best-known book Earthly Heaven, physician to Vilém of Rosenberg (see Český Krumlov), worked for the Rosenbergs in their Hradčany palace. In Rudolf’s final years, Jakub Hořčický, or Sinapius, of Tepenec worked in his alchemical laboratory seeking the elixir of life. In 1608 he was ennobled after successfully treating the emperor. He distilled so-called sinapic waters from various medicinal plants, sold under that name in Bohemian pharmacies long after his death. He was an ardent supporter of the Jesuits, to whom he bequeathed considerable wealth.