| 释义 |
† sericon Alch. Obs.
[a. med.L. sericon (indeclinable).
In Turbæ Philosophorum alterum exemplar, printed in Artis Auriferæ quam Chemiam vocant volumen primum (Basileæ 1593) 138, ‘sericon’ is mentioned (in connexion with ‘magnesia’: see magnesia 1) as ‘a composition which is called by ten names’, and which is one of the ingredients in ‘the ferment of gold’. That the word originally stood for some real chemical substance is not improbable, but its proper meaning and etymology (perh. Arabic: ? cf. zircon) are obscure. There is no ground for identifying it with mod.L. sericum (prob. merely a use of L. sēricum silk) cited by writers of the 18th c. as a name for the flowers of zinc. On the other hand, ‘Sericum, an old name for minium’, in some modern dictionaries, may represent a conjecture as to the meaning of the alchemical term.]
A substance supposed to be concerned in the transmutation of inferior metals into gold.
The explanation given in Gifford's note on the Jonson passage, ‘the red tincture’, appears to be an unauthorized conjecture.
15..in Ashmole Theat. Chem. (1652) 428 This centrall Earth who can it take, It and Sercion [sic] do our Maistry make. 1610B. Jonson Alch. ii. v, Both Sericon, and Bufo shall be lost. |