Jacob Alstein

Jacob Alstein (* around 1570 or 1575; † after 1620) was a German doctor and alchemist .

Alstein studied medicine at the University of Helmstedt with a doctorate in 1596. The first evidence of an activity as an alchemist is a letter from 1602 to Duke Ulrich von Mecklenburg . He was known to many well-known alchemists and Paracelsists, such as Sendivogius (in whose novelty Lumen Chymicum he is said to have been involved), Karl Widemann in Augsburg, Joachim Morsius in Hamburg, Johann Kaper in Prague and with Landgrave Moritz von Hessen-Kassel (at whom he was in 1615). In particular, he also had connections to France, for example to the Paracelsists Israel Harvet and Joseph Duchesne . In 1606 he was in Rome and in 1608/09 he was the personal physician of Henry IV of France.

There are no known writings ascribed to him, but he was considered one of the most respected alchemists of his time. Israel Harvet dedicated his commentary on the Tractatus vere aureus by Hermes Trismegistus (1610) to him. His lost main work was De tribus lapidibus , of which no print is known. But letters have been received.

literature

• Julian Paulus: Jacob Alstein , in: Claus Priesner , Karin Figala : Alchemie. Lexicon of a Hermetic Science , Beck 1998 at Academia
• Julian Paulus: Alchemy and Paracelsism around 1600 , in; Joachim Telle (Ed.) Analecta Paracelsica , 1994, p. 384 at Academia