The Alchemical Papers of Sir Isaac Newton

The following are photos I took of the alchemical notes of Sir Isaac Newton, which are located in the Dibner Library, in the Museum of American History in Washington, DC. This library, one of the Smithsonian Libraries, contains an amazing collection of rare books on the history of science. These papers of Newton are the ones mentioned in The Eight. At that time they were located in Cambridge, but Cambridge found them embarrassing because they wanted to maintain Newton's reputation as a serious scientist. They didn't realize that alchemy is the father of modern chemistry. The meeting between Newton and Voltaire in The Eight is fictitious, of course. I took these pictures during my tour of the Dibner Library, which Katherine Neville organized, on June 24, 2019. Later, she invited me to her apartment, where we had a delightful visit, which you can read about here.

For more about these papers, watch the video that Katherine Neville filmed during this visit, where she talks about them.








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