Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry

The Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry, founded as the Society for the Study of Alchemy and Early Chemistry in 1935, holds biennial meetings and a yearly Graduate Workshop, publishes the journal Ambix and a biennial newsletter Chemical Intelligence, and offers prizes and grants to scholars.

[1] Its object was “the study of alchemy and early chemistry in their scientific and historical aspects, and the publication of relevant material.”[2] Sherwood Taylor was responsible for launching the Society’s journal Ambix in May 1937, with J.R. Partington as its first Chairman.

[4] From 1956 onwards, when Desmond Geoghegan became editor, Ambix began to extend its readership and its period of historical coverage to the time of John Dalton and the nineteenth century.

Recent special issues include: New Studies on Humphry Davy (May and August 2019); The Royal Typographer and the Alchemist: Willem Silvius and John Dee (May 2017); From the Library to the Laboratory and Back Again (May 2016); and Chemical Knowledge in Transit (November 2015).

Research Awards are open to postgraduate students, those who have obtained a PhD within 10 years of the preceding 1 January and independent scholars.

The second grant is the Subject Development Award, which supports activities such as seminars, workshops, colloquia, lecture series, conferences, etc.