Arthur Dee

[2]In 2018, Megan Piorko, a PhD student at Georgia State University, discovered a coded text in one of Dee's alchemical notebooks purporting to contain a recipe for the so-called philosopher's stone, a mythical elixir of life capable of changing base metals into gold or silver and of imparting immortality.

[3] The decoded text describes the processing of an alchemical "egg" in an athanor, a slow-burning furnace popular with alchemists.

If all steps are followed correctly, "you will have a truly gold-making elixir by whose benevolence all the misery of poverty is put to flight and those who suffer from any illness will be restored to health," the text states.

[3] Arthur Dee, having fathered six sons and six daughters, died in September or October 1651 and was buried in St George's Church, Tombland, Norwich.

[4] In the early 20th century, Rasputin stole a number of Arthur Dee's Russian translations of his father's writings.