The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley

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Finally, in early December 1571, the Queen incorporated the investors in the alchemical scheme as the ―Governor and Society of the New Art‖, with Sir Thomas Smith as the first governor. 97 The patent granted the Society a monopoly on ―a new and certain art to try out and make of iron very true and perfect copper‖. 98 Anyone who breached the Society‘s monopoly would have their equipment confiscated and be imprisoned for one year. The patent makes clear the massive potential benefits of this alchemical process for the English economy, specifically that it will be very profitable to Us our heirs and successors for the making of our ordnance and other munitions for the wars and for many other like uses, and also to all other the people and subjects of this our Realm of England 99 The patent also specified that for the next five years the Society would have to give the royal treasury either £100, or a tenth of the copper and mercury they created. Unfortunately for the project, that same month Smith, who amongst Medley‘s patrons had the best practical understanding of the alchemical methods involved, was assigned to head an embassy to France to pursue Elizabeth's marriage to the duc d'Anjou. With Cecil thoroughly engaged with affairs of state, Smith expected Gilbert to keep an eye on proceedings in Poole. Almost immediately Smith began to fret over the security of his significant investment in the scheme. He was justified in his fears. Gilbert time and again refused to make the trip to Poole to supervise the works, being ―abused with Mr. Medeley‘s words and great promises that he can lead you by the nose whither he will, like a bufle[bull]‖. 100 The situation at Poole quickly descended into an expensive farce. Lord Mountjoy claimed that Medley‘s stop-gap production of copperas and alum infringed his own monopoly over the creation of alum, while Smith worried about the practicality of Medley‘s 97 ‗Society of the New Art‘, Patent Rolls, 14 Eliz., pt. xii in Cecil Thomas Carr, Select Charters of Trading Companies, A.D. 1530–1707, New York, 1970, p. 21. 98 Ibid., pp. 21-22. The patent also gave them a monopoly on the transmutations of ―antimony and lead [into] likewise true and perfect quicksilver‖. Strangely, there is no evidence that the Society ever tried to take advantage of this process. 99 Ibid., p. 21. 100 Thomas Smith to Humfrey Gilbert, 8 February 1572, TNA, SP 70/146 f.16r. 136
new process which ―my Lord Burghley and my lord of Leicester do like‖. 101 Meanwhile, Medley had realised that, despite assurances from Smith, the Society‘s patent omitted his name entirely. Medley characteristically assumed this was part of Gilbert‘s intrigues to deprive him of his process. Smith, trapped in Paris and distrustful of Medley‘s ―negligence, riot and inconstancy‖, instructed Gilbert to travel to Poole and insinuate himself with Medley‘s assistant Cornelius Stephenson, ―because you have no acquayntance there nor knowedge of the earths‖. 102 Smith had come to suspect that Mr. Medley will always be like himself, that is to mar the good gifts which God and his industry hath gotten to him by the evil ordering of himself 103 Cecil attempted to prevent the disintegration of the project by promising Medley that he would try to convince the Queen to create a new patent, with Medley‘s name included. 104 Medley wrote indignantly to Cecil that but for ―the loose dealinge that I have suforyd‖ the endeavour would have already been worth over £1,000. 105 Nevertheless, on his return from France in July 1572, Smith found the works at Poole abandoned, himself owing rent to Lady Mountjoy and wages to unpaid workmen, and that Medley had fled to Ireland. 106 Historians have assumed that this fiasco deterred the nobility from costly ventures in industrial alchemy, or at least from investing in Medley‘s copper making process. However, by 1574 Medley had resurrected his enterprise on Parys Mountain, on the Isle of Anglesey, Wales. 107 By boiling scrap iron in the mineral waters of Parys Mountain, rich in sulphate of copper after flowing through copper ores, Medley no longer required the expensive vitriol, making for a much more economical project. 108 Cecil, and Leicester, along with Sir Francis Walsingham and Sir Henry Sidney, also devotees of alchemy, made 101 Ibid. 102 Thomas Smith to Humfrey Gilbert, 20 May 1572, SP70/146 f.56v. 103 Thomas Smith to Humfrey Gilbert, 10 April 1572, SP70/146 f.40r. 104 William Medley to Cecil, 19 April 1572, TNA, SP 12/86/14. 105 Ibid. 106 Smith to Cecil and Leicester, Lansdowne Vol. 19, No. 45. 107 Ibid. 108 John Henry Pepper, The Playbook of Metals: Including Personal Narratives of Visits to Coal, Lead, Copper, and Tin Mines, London, 1861, p. 274. 137
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The Alchemical Patronage of Sir Wil
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Abstract This thesis examines the a
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Acknowledgements Thanks must first
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List of Abbreviations APC Acts of t
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Introduction William Cecil, through
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late seventeenth and early eighteen
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economic policy, only cursory exami
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otherwise. The dull, elderly, burea
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y such prolific authors as A. E. Wa
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marginalised the importance of alch
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Many of the distortions in the hist
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difficult to access with microfilm
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Chapter 1: Cecil and Alchemical Phi
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other aspects of medieval knowledge
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explain why alchemy made sense in t
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accuracy of the Aristotelian texts.
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short-sighted match. 44 There is ev
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University in the period. 56 A high
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some tentative conclusions about Ce
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Cecil tended to favour more practic
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Actes and Monuments (1563), ―fata
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Dee and Cecil‘s relationship over
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symbolism, seems tenuous. It ignore
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great pleasure in the workes of Nat
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demonstrated the divine spirit of l
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alchemical knowledge than his geogr
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eports to Cecil are almost exclusiv
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Thynne also affirmed the importance
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From Longleat Thynne wrote for Ceci
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his desperate financial situation.
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no significant records of their pra
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such as John Dee and country gentle
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The late 1560s saw the first signif
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eminently qualified to deal with th
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the patronage of James Blount, Lord
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medicines. Amongst the collection o
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gold into France to fund Catholic e
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in distayne‖. 98 However, it is n
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of a dedicatory epistle to Cecil, f
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home I have not seen‖. 120 Where
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of yeeres before Paracelsus time‖
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Henry Bossevyle suggested practical
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metal and European currencies, furt
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De Lannoy first came to the attenti
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god send it her majesty as trouly a
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perform alchemy. Rather, Waad belie
Page 93 and 94: and Leicester. 56 De Lannoy promise
Page 95 and 96: Cecil could not convince the Queen,
Page 97 and 98: the accounts of Elias Ashmole and S
Page 99 and 100: context of Dee‘s failed English C
Page 101 and 102: By March 1589 Dee had left Bohemia
Page 103 and 104: entirely self centred‖. 117 Cecil
Page 105 and 106: Cecil and the Queen‘s demands tha
Page 107 and 108: love and honor vertue and knolledge
Page 109 and 110: Kelley‘s demise. 148 Wotton repor
Page 111 and 112: depryved of his libertye and frends
Page 113 and 114: According to Page, Kelley had not i
Page 115 and 116: a number of attempts to convince Ke
Page 117 and 118: For the Queen and Cecil, Smith‘s
Page 119 and 120: £500 from the company, they were t
Page 121 and 122: payment. Peterson refused them; he
Page 123 and 124: Smith‘s plan, they must have been
Page 125 and 126: Chapter Four: Alchemy and Economic
Page 127 and 128: essays Meta Incognita: A Discourse
Page 129 and 130: y chance she threw and burned in th
Page 131 and 132: y others without trewthe‖. 25 Wal
Page 133 and 134: work did not make this link, and ne
Page 135 and 136: linked. It is, however, significant
Page 137 and 138: laming betrayal, setbacks and decep
Page 139 and 140: to involve cementation rather than
Page 141 and 142: Clearly aware of Cecil‘s rising i
Page 143: certainly the practical expert, who
Page 147 and 148: Image 3: An Elizabethan Map of the
Page 149 and 150: was the potential benefit for the C
Page 151 and 152: Medley ―by commaundement mencyone
Page 153 and 154: thanked Wotton for his letter detai
Page 155 and 156: intention to have medled with any c
Page 157 and 158: and to have received through his fa
Page 159 and 160: again imprisoned, this time almost
Page 161 and 162: was a key investor, attempted to ut
Page 163 and 164: understanding of nature. John Dee,
Page 165 and 166: promised ―an ounce or so of powde
Page 167 and 168: conviction regarding the reality of
Page 169 and 170: ———, Calendar of Patent Rolls
Page 171 and 172: Bennet, Henry, A Famous and Godly H
Page 173 and 174: Szulakowska, Urszula, ‗The Pseudo
Page 175 and 176: Fiddler, Paul A., and Thomas J. May
Page 177 and 178: Matthews, John, (ed.), The Rosicruc
Page 179 and 180: ———, The Life of the Learned
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The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley

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