Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist epitomises the modern conception of alchemy as an occult and fundamentally fraudulent pseudoscience. The work of historians of alchemy over the past three decades has largely been to dispel myths of alchemy, particularly those suggesting any association with the supernatural, that have developed ever since Subtle, Face, and Doll first duped their gullible aspirants. To understand the alchemy of the late medieval and early modern periods, we have to remember that most alchemists were performing interesting and sometimes useful chemical operations, whether that be in the field of pharmaceuticals, metallurgy, dyeing and ink-making, jewellery; or whether they were simply furthering understanding of the natural world, discovering compounds and inventing apparatus and procedures. However, whilst the association between alchemy and magic does seem to be a seventeenth-century invention, alchemists have never been far from accusations of the sort of fraudulence on show in Jonson’s great comedy.

In her 2020 book, The Experimental Fire: Inventing English Alchemy, 1300–1700, Jennifer Rampling details the way in which English alchemy in the late Middle Ages ‘developed in a fraught context of state concern over bullion shortage, inadequate currency, and rampant counterfeiting’. Although alchemical knowledge was not needed to counterfeit coin, alchemists – some of whom were, of course, partial to fraudulence – were often lumped together with counterfeiters and coin-clippers throughout the fourteenth century. Rampling describes the strange relationship between successive kings and those who professed to be able to perform alchemy. Edward III patronised alchemists in hope of securing funds for his costly wars with France; he also no doubt employed alchemists, skilled in the art of alloying, to assist in the minting of his 1343 gold coin. However, when William de Brumley was caught in possession of counterfeit gold in 1347, he was arrested and tried. In 1403/4, Henry IV outlawed the ‘multiplication’ of metal, that is the production of metals that looked like gold or silver, and yet successive kings granted licences allowing specific alchemists to practise. Throughout the fourteenth century, a pattern emerges: kings cracked down on alchemists seen to be committing fraud whilst simultaneously holding out hope that good alchemists could fill the royal coffers. In Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist, alchemy is a purely linguistic affair; there is no physical transformation of materials.