Wilhelm Homberg was born at Batavia (modern Jakarta) in 1652 while his father was serving as an officer of the Dutch East India Company.
In that town he made the acquaintance of Otto von Guericke, and under his influence determined to devote himself to natural science.
From 1685 to 1690 he practised as a physician at Rome; then returning to Paris in 1691, he was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences and appointed director of communication by Madame Wagner, December 28, 1697.
He did attempt chrysopoeia but also he made what are still regarded as solid contributions to chemical and physical knowledge, recording observations on the preparation of Kunkel's phosphorus, on the green colour produced in flames by copper, on the crystallization of common salt, on the salts of plants, on the saturation of bases by acids, on the freezing of water and its evaporation in vacuo, etc.
[2] The "Sal Sedativum Hombergi" is boracic acid, which he discovered in 1702, and "Homberg's phosphorus" is prepared by fusing sal-ammoniac with quick lime.