"Towards the end of the Middle Ages, something strange started happening across Europe. People started believing they were made from glass. They firmly believed that they could shatter if touched. This became known as the “glass delusion”, and most cases involved the rich and the powerful. But what caused this strange phenomenon? And why did it disappear almost as swiftly as it appeared? Here are 30 things you need to know if you want to understand the bizarre history of the glass delusion… The glass delusion may have emerged as Europe was moving towards the Age of Enlightenment, but some men of science still investigated it thoroughly. The German alchemist Johann Becher was especially fascinated by the phenomenon. In his 1669 work Physica Subterranea, he even went so far as to claim that he had found the secret to turning humans into glass. Or, more specifically, Belcher boasted of knowing how to turn dead bodies into glass objects."

Comprehensive, well-illustrated article on this strange delusion:

https://historycollection.com/nobles-use...-breaking/

Becher's work here:

https://archive.org/details/johjoachimib...h/mode/2up

"The opinion has become almost universal that Alchemy was a pretended science, by which gold and silver were to be produced by transmutation of the elements of the baser metals; and its professors are at this day regarded as the dupes of imposture, and as having been themselves impostors and charlatans. In these classes they are placed by the writers of books; and the prejudice has been so long cherished, that, for the present, there is small ground for hope of its uprooting. The peculiar language employed by the alchemists is now commonly denominated "jargon," and this epithet appears to be conclusive logic with those whose convictions are chiefly produced by the employment of opprobrious names. Yet a candid and critical examination of the Hermetic writers, we think, will entirely disabuse the mind of any intelligent person. It is plain enough, that their directions in relation to transmuting metals are scarcely at all to be connected with any known manipulations now known as chemical. Yet it would be presumptuous to vilify such men as Roger Bacon, Boerhave, and Van Helmont, as ignorant, or to accuse them of imposture. We propose, therefore in this essay, to direct inquiry in another quarter for the purpose of indicating what was really the scope of the science or philosophy, formerly extant under the name of Alchemy."

https://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/boo...npa-hp.htm

Essay on Wilder by John S. Haller, Jr.: https://lloydlibrary.org/wp-content/uplo...al_.11.pdf

https://theosophy.wiki/en/Alexander_Wilder

"Muḥammad ibn Umayl al-Tamīmī (Arabic: محمد بن أميل التميمي), known in Latin as Senior Zadith, was an early Muslim alchemist who lived from c. 900 to c. 960 AD."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Umayl

   

"Philipp Hones and Jennifer Matschey take a closer look at the abundance of small creatures populating a ceramic plate of French artist Bernard Palissy (1510-1590). By molding the animals directly from nature, the artist undertakes the process of creation in its truest sense – the article explores Palissy’s stand in the discourse of mimesis and imitatio, and how his work ties into the alchemical worldview."

https://merian-alchemie.ub.uni-frankfurt...figulines/

https://www.deepl.com/translator

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Palissy

"Kristofer Schliephake explores the mythical unicorn and its depiction, as well as its meaning in an alchemical context, especially referring to the late medieval emblem book Lambspring. A ferocious beast, a symbol for quicksilver, a religious allegory, and a gentle, elusive creature with healing properties: Historically, the unicorn proves to have many different facets, which this article elaborates on."

https://merian-alchemie.ub.uni-frankfurt...-alchemie/

https://www.deepl.com/translator

Upgraded from 'poisoner' to 'alchemist and poisoner'.

"Vanens came from Arles and called himself Chevalier de Vanens. He was arrested by the direct orders of Louvois on 5 December 1677, after having declared that he was able to make gold and had been observed with a banknote of 200,000 livres."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_de_Vanens

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affair_of_the_Poisons

"In 1689, master builder Fabrizio Mansani saves his brother, who has been sentenced to death on a false charge, and wants to leave Venice. But his deed did not go unobserved and so he was forced by the chamberlain Ducatini, desperate because of the empty state coffers, to help him in a deceptive manoeuvre. Officially, Leibniz and Newton are to devote themselves to building an observatory - larger than that of the Vatican. But Newton's main task is to produce gold for Venice and the chamberlain threatens to extradite him to Rome as a sorcerer if he refuses ..."

https://www.amazon.de/Alchemist-von-Vene...B0C3R6X4X5


   

"Glosses in the Greek text of 1 Enoch in Codex Panopolitanus may plausibly be traced to the alchemist Zosimos of Panopolis or to his students."

https://www.academia.edu/91535602/From_t..._Panapolis

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Enoch

Limited Edition.
From the Latin edition of Nicholas Barnaud Delphinas, Restored Engravings by Joel Radcliffe


At Miskatonic:

https://www.miskatonicbooks.com/product/...-chapbook/

Alchemical treatises (Cambridge, University Library, MS Kk.6.30)

At Cambridge Univ. Digital Library:

https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-KK-00006-00030/1