A photo from open sources
Arthur Conan Doyle has the novel “The Opening of the Rafles Howe”. Her the hero invents a method of transforming chemical elements from one in the other, respectively, and gold production. But the scientist is not in a hurry to publish its discovery. In this case, reasoning Hou, gold will immediately depreciate and something will take its place another.
The scientist prefers to trade his gold secretly, and the proceeds uses money for charity and help to those in need. The directly opposite task is set by engineer Garin at Alexey Tolstoy. He is eager for the inexhaustible reserves of gold of the Earth, to bring chaos to the world economy and seize power.
Gold is the eternal dream of alchemists, and not only them. Over alchemy chuckle – pseudoscience, they say, and nothing more. In fact, no one until he learned to “bake” gold in his kitchen. But if still assume that once people owned the secrets of transmutation elements?
The Wrath of Emperor Diocletian
In the early Christian era, not many doubted that the priests Ancient Egypt knows the secret of getting gold. And thanks the activities of the Academy of Alexandria in the II-IV centuries, the conviction is only strengthened. It got to the point that the Roman emperor Diocletian in 296 issued a special decree. It prescribed to betray burning all the Egyptian manuscripts about artificial receipt gold.
Surely Diocletian was preoccupied with the troubles that fraught with such knowledge for trade and economic good state. The enlightened emperor was hardly so ignorant that he issued a similar decree without good reason. What were the reasons – now it’s impossible to establish. Many the treasures of human thought perished in the flames of wars and conflagration, let’s recall the Alexandria and Carthage libraries, looted and destroyed. What secret knowledge was stored there?
Legend of the Star City
In early February 1517, the Esperanza caravel under captain Rafael Rodriguez crashed near Jamaica, 300 miles southeast of Cuba, controlled by at that time the governor of the Spanish king Charles V Diego Velazquez. IN half-bruised skiff almost without food and fresh water turned out to be 13 a man led by Rodriguez himself. 10 days, a fragile boat was worn by the waves of the Yucatan Strait until it was washed to the Mexican shore.
Of the 13 sailors, only seven survived … They were captured by the Indians Maya led by Hala Kayyara and delivered to the city Champoton. The ruler of the city of Moch Kouo ordered to immediately bring five captives as a sacrifice to the gods … Two survived, Raphael Rodriguez and Martos Sanchez – their turn has not yet arrived. Spaniards locked in some house, but they managed to take apart the wall and run into forest.
After a month of hungry wanderings, sailors joined the expedition Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba arriving in Mexico on three ships in March 1517. Their story became known to the world. It was believed that Captain Rafael Rodriguez and his six sailors unhappy team – the first Europeans stepped on the land of Maya.
But according to the legend, which will be discussed, this was not so. IN 1514 with the blessing of the Holy See to His Majesty addressed Alvaro Aguileri, Bishop of Toledo, whom no one in Rome did not want to see because of its excessive even for the inquisitor cruelty. Aguileri invited the king to equip an expedition to Mexico in order to bring the lost nations the light of Christianity and give them under the protection of the Spanish crown. The project was accepted, but kept in strict secret – so it was easier in case of failure to hide the shame defeat, and if successful, dazzle the brilliance held triumph.
Aguileri set about preparing the expedition. More has arisen difficulties than he expected, and only in mid-July 1516 an armed detachment of 100 people landed in Mexico with a 30-gun ship “Spain”. After a thorough study of the area and interrogations Indians detachment moved inland.
A photo from open sources
Aguileri did not lead his people to the powerful Aztec empire, where ruled Montezuma, and to the south, to a city sheltered behind forests and mountains, called in the language of the Indians Star (certainly not the same mythical Eldorado?). The innumerable wealth of Star City, oh which the Indians narrated was what called the bishop on the road.
Two months later, the Aguileri squad, thinned by a third due to insidious ambushes, attacks of predators, unknown diseases and bites poisonous snakes and insects, reached the goal. Having deceived into the city, the Spaniards suppressed all the resistance of the inhabitants in a few hours, there was nothing to oppose the firearms of strangers. A city full of gold and temptations lay at the feet of Aguileri, and in magnificent temples instead of broken idols rose Catholic crosses.
It would seem that it’s time to send the king a victory message and chests of gold … However, there it was. Aguileri nurtured other plans. Seeing around a lot of gold, the bishop set the goal is to get to its source. To his extreme astonishment, no gold deposits were found on miles around … So, they brought gold to the Star City from afar? But where and how, in such enormous quantities, with full lack of communication lines and vehicles?
A photo from open sources
Information about the fate of the Aguileri expedition in Spain did not wait, but and soon forgot about it, for the loud exploits of Cortes pushed back to shadow first attempt at a civilizational mission in the country idolaters. Aguileri, obsessed only with gold, did not pay attention to neither numerous copper deposits nor strange rites of priests associated with the melting of metals. He died, never solving a riddle.
Here’s what needs to be added. In 1978, in Bulgaria, near the city of Varna, during archaeological excavations the burial grounds of the VI-V centuries BC were discovered the richest treasures of gold items – a total of more than 400 kilograms!
Meanwhile, there were no gold deposits in the Balkans and no, but copper is plentiful. Gold brought here from afar? Maybe. But gold treasures are found in Nigeria and in Mesopotamia. – where there is no precious metal, but there is a lot of copper. So don’t Has copper once served as a raw material for gold?
Medieval transformations
But medieval European alchemists? What were their successes in this field? One of the tireless enthusiasts’ golden fever “became the famous Dutch alchemist van Helmont. True, he personally did not happen to invent a philosopher’s stone. But he repeatedly received from other alchemists samples of this mysterious substances with which transmutation was undertaken.
So, he wrote that in 1618 he turned eight ounces of mercury at using a quarter grains of this stone in pure gold. Opportunity cheating by the sampler who delivered the test, according to van Helmont, was expelled, since he was not present at transmutation.
A photo from open sources
There have been cases of public demonstrations of such transformations. Sometimes after the death of famous alchemists, gold bullions were found. Leonardo da Vinci recommended in his notes: “Considering carefully branches of gold, you will see at their ends that they are slow and gradually grow, turning into gold what they touch. ”
Is it possible in principle? And if possible, how?
How is this possible?
The carrier of the chemical properties of any element is its electronic shell, but its structure is “encoded” in the nucleus of an atom. Using chemical reactions, you can add or reduce electrons, but as long as the core is unchanged, the element will still remain the same. Therefore, any transmutation of elements is a nuclear reaction. Are they possible under ordinary conditions, without gigantic temperatures, achievable except in an atomic explosion?
A number of leading scientists believe: yes, this is possible with catalysts. In chemistry, these are substances that accelerate many times reactions. But then chemistry, but are nuclear catalysts possible? Theoretically, yes. If you could “deploy” the nucleus of an atom, bring closer to another, then it would be possible to get gold from lighter copper. Theoretically, this is incontrovertible, but on practice, modern science is still very far from such results.
So could ancient scholars have such knowledge? Definitely difficult to answer. But you need to keep in mind that transformations in nature there is its universal property and they can be accelerated many times by picking up appropriate catalysts. In addition, we often re “discover” what has long been discovered, albeit not rational by way, but by an intuitive train of thought.
Curiosities
And I would like to complete this article with funny oddities, related to our topic. So, in 1854 to the French Academy of sciences a certain Teofil Tiffero appeared and introduced … two ingots artificial gold, supposedly taught in Mexico. This case caused extreme irritation in D.I. Mendeleev who took him as an attempt on the very foundations of chemistry.
And at the end of the XIX century in America made a lot of noise scam Jonathan Emmens, who proposed … transforming Mexican silver dollars to gold. The corresponding joint-stock company, which soon burst safely. It is curious that the con man was so convincing that he attracted the attention of prominent scientists of the time, such as Archibald Geiki and William Crookes.
However, we will leave quacks on their extremely dubious Olympus. As for alchemy, then, as the medieval scholastic claimed, monk and heretic Marcus Delmonte, “the inner meaning of this science is the conjugation, that is, the ratio of the whole to the components its parts. Correctly understood alchemy deals with conscious the force governing mutations and transmutations within matter, energy and even inside life itself … ”
Andrey Bystrov
Time Stones Mexico Mayan Civilization
