Aureus tractatus de philosophorum lapide
A 1677 alchemical treatise on the philosophers' stone, printed by Hermannus a Sande, with copper-engraved and woodcut plates of emblems and symbolic diagrams. The pictures show alchemical cosmology: a zodiac wheel around a central star labelled Mirabilitas Natura, a sun-and-cross device, and a ring of figures gathered at a well. A designer could draw on their dense Latin mottoes, radiating sun rays, and circular emblem frames for symbolic, esoteric graphics.
