Apocalypsis Hermetis

also:
Apocalypsis spiritus secreti

I. Basic information

Printing History, Manuscripts. Two versions: one in Latin, the other in German. The Latin version is never attributed to Paracelsus; the German version most often is. First printed in Latin in 1566, not ascribed to Paracelsus, but explicitly “incerto Authore.” The Latin text is accompanied by an Italian commentary by Giovan Battista Agnello (who was also the editor of the whole volume) and was published in London. – German version A first printed in 1603; edited from other sources by I.P.S.M.S. in 1604, and Benedictus Figulus in 1608. – German version B first printed in 1606, edited by Franz Kieser. – Four Latin manuscripts (not ascribed to Paracelsus). Many German manuscripts of version A, most of them ascribed to Paracelsus. One German manuscript of version B.

Editions. Edited by Ps.-Huser, Opera Bücher vnd Schrifften (1603), 2: 668–671. Not edited by Sudhoff.

Relationship between different versions. First written in Latin, then translated into German. The Stuttgart Catalogus lists two German manuscripts, but the second only is attributed to Paracelsus and is described as “mit zuhintrest angehenkten figuren” (with illustrations at the end).

Structure, genre/form, perspective, style.

Relationship to other texts. Cited in De tinctura physicorum (§ ‎4.30): “Wiewol nuh die erst Experientz der Tinctur diesen Proceß vor der Fixation geben hat/ und unsere Voreltern auch vilmals seind ihres begerens vollmechtig worden: So hetten sie doch vil einen neheren weg zu des rhoten Löwens Schatzkammer gehabt/ wann sie der Astronomiae Concordantz mit der Alchimey gelehrnet hetten/ als ich sie in Apocalypsi Hermetis angezeigt hab.” (Huser, 6: 368). – Paracelsus is named “Hermes Secundus” for the first time in the Ps.-Huser edition of the Apocalypsis; he has the same title in one of the Kassel manuscripts of the Apocalypsis.

 A text by Johannes de Sole, Die fünf Wesen des verborgenen Geists Theophrasti (part of Johannes de Sole, Arcana arcanorum), adopts part of the Apocalypsis Hermetis.

Authenticity, authorship. This is a rewriting of the beginning of De consideratione quintae essentiae by Johannes de Rupescissa, followed by other alchemical considerations drawing from medieval sources and revolving around a medieval alchemical topic, that of the spiritus occultus (“hidden spirit”). Only the German version was attributed to Paracelsus.

Time of writing. Probably written in the first half of the 16th century (or earlier?). Later attributed to Paracelsus in the 1560s.

II. Sources

Manuscripts:

Latin

• Firenze, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana: Plut.89 sup.36, f. 230r–231v
• London, Wellcome Library: MS 1700, 217–227
• Oxford, Bodleian Library: MS. Ashmole 1467, f. 202v–208v
• Oxford, Bodleian Library: MS. Ashmole 1490, f. 15r–17v

German (version A)

• Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek: Mscr.Dresd.N.54, f. 14r–18r
• Kassel, Landesbibliothek: 4° Ms. chem. 22, f. 270r–276v
• Kassel, Landesbibliothek: 4° Ms. chem. 60[7,1, f. 1r–6r
• Kassel, Landesbibliothek: 4° Ms. chem. 87, f. 129r–138v
• Lindau, Ehemals Reichsstädtische Bibliothek: Hs. P II 39; 27 pages
• Lindau, Ehemals Reichsstädtische Bibliothek: Hs. P IV 1, f. 1r–13v
• Lübeck, Stadtbibliothek: Ms. math. 4° 9, f. 37r–40r
• Solothurn, Zentralbibliothek: Cod. S I 185, f. 188r–191v
• Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek: Cod. Guelf. 74 Blank, f. 753r–759r

German (version B)

• Hamburg, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek: Cod. alchim. 661, 341–351 [copied from the printed 1606 edition]
• Kassel, Landesbibliothek: 4° Ms. chem. 22, f. 267r–269v

Johannes de Sole, Arcana arcanorum

• Bamberg, Staatsbibliothek: Msc. Nat. 13
• Philadelphia (PA), Penn Libraries: Ms. Codex 128
• Praha, Strahovská knihovna: Cod. DF IV 36, f. 52r–83r
• Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Cod. 264.31 Extr., ca. 668–691

First printed:

• 1566 (Latin; in Espositione di Giouanbatista Agnello Venetiano supra vn libro intitolato Apocalypsis spiritus secreti (London, 1566))
• 1603 (German version A; in Ps.-Huser, Opera Bücher vnd Schrifften (1603); VD17 12:168390P; Sudhoff, Bibliographia Paracelsica, 443–446 n° 257)
• 1604 (German version A; in I.P.S.M.S., ed., Alchimia vera, Das ist: Der wahren vnd von Gott hochbenedeyten/ Natur gemessen Edlen Kunst Alchimia wahre beschreibung (no place, 1604); VD17 12:132982U; Sudhoff, Bibliographia Paracelsica, 453–454 n° 265)
• 1606 (German version B; in Franz Kieser, ed., Cabala Chymica. Concordantia Chymica. Azot Philosoph. Solificatum. Drey vnnterschiedliche/ Nützliche/ vnd zuvor nie außgegangene Tractätlein (Mühlhausen: Martin Spieß for Johann Spieß, 1606); VD17 12:650901T; Sudhoff, Bibliographia Paracelsica, 473–474 n° 277)
• 1608 (German version A; in Benedictus Figulus, ed., Pandora Magnalium Naturalium Aurea Benedicta, De Benedicto Lapidis Philosoph. Mysterio (Strasburg: Lazarus Zetzner, 1608); VD17 23:277709W; Sudhoff, Bibliographia Paracelsica, 480–482 n° 282)

Historical Manuscript Catalogues: Catalogus (Stuttgart), II, f. 1r, n° [5] and f. 1v, [12]; Widemann, Verzeichnisse (Kassel), n° I, 127; Uffenbach (1720), VIII, col. 655–658 n° 12/XIV [=Hamburg, alchim. 661]; von Linden (1788), part 2, 273 n° 357

III. Bibliography

Essential bibliography: Sudhoff, Bibliographia Paracelsica, 445–446; Sudhoff, Paracelsus-Handschriften, 798 n° IV/18; CP 3: 67, 1109.

Further bibliographical references:

Lynn Thorndike, A History of magic and experimental Science, vol. 5 (New York, 1951), 624.

Peuckert, Pansophie (1956), 285–286, 290, 414, 431, 465, 470, 471.

Mario Rosa, “Giovan Battista Agnello,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, 1 (1960).

Gilly, Paracelsus in der BPH (Amsterdam, 1993), 49–50.

Gilly, “Das Bekenntnis zur Gnosis” (2000), 397.

Florian Ebeling, “‘Geheimnis’ und ‘Geheimhaltung’ in den Hermetica der Frühen Neuzeit,” in Anne-Charlott Trepp and Hartmut Lehmann, eds., Antike Weisheit und kulturelle Praxis. Hermetismus in der frühen Neuzeit (Göttingen, 2001), 63–80, on 68–69.

James Stuart Campbell, The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Master’s thesis (Wellington 2009), online (https://core.ac.uk/display/41336603, accessed 18 April 2021), 121–124.

Kahn, “Le retour de Gérard Dorn” (2010–2011), 149.

Gilly, “Vom ägyptischen Hermes zum Trismegistus Germanus” (2010), 80, 81, 86–87, 114.

Broszinski, Manuscripta chemica in quarto (2011), 75, 264, 365.

Volkhard Wels, Manifestationen des Geistes. Frömmigkeit, Spiritualismus und Dichtung in der Frühen Neuzeit (Göttingen, 2014), 137–138, 141, 149, 153, 176.

Florian Ebeling, “Alchemical Hermetism,” in Christopher Partridge, ed., The Occult World (Abingdon-New York, 2015), 74–91.

Florian Ebeling, Das Geheimnis des Hermes Trismegistos. Geschichte des Hermetismus von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 3rd. rev. ed. (Munich, 2018), 107.