The first stage of the Great Work: putrefaction, blackening, and the death of the prima materia. Saturn presides; black bile and melancholy mark the body. The matter must die before it can be reborn. In Atalanta Fugiens this is the work of dragons devouring their tails (XIV), the king drowning (XXXI), the dragon-and-woman mortal embrace (L), the slaying of Osiris (XLIV).
Atalanta Fugiens emblems classified to Nigredo 17
Open the gallery filtered to Nigredo →
Emblem I
His nurse is the Earth
The wind carried it in its belly.
Emblem II
Its nurse is the Earth
Its nurse is the Earth.
Emblem IV
Join brother and sister
Join brother and sister and give them the cup of love.
Emblem V
Woman suckling the toad
Put a toad to the breasts of a woman, that she may suckle it, and the woman may die and the toad grow big from the milk.
Emblem VIII
Emblem VIII
Take the egg and pierce it with a fiery sword.
Emblem IX
Emblem IX
Fix the old man to the tree in the garden of the dew, and the old man becomes young again.
Emblem XIV
Emblem XIV
This is the dragon that devours its own tail.
Emblem XIX
Emblem XIX
If you kill one of the four, every body will be dead immediately.
Emblem XXIV
Alchemical King (garbed)
The wolf devoured the king, and after the wolf had been burnt, it returned the king to life.
Emblem XXV
Emblem XXV
The Dragon does not die, if it is not killed by its brother and sister, that is to say by Sol and Luna.
Emblem XXVIII
King Duenech in steam bath
The king is bathed, sitting in a steam-bath, and is freed from the black bile by Pharut.
Emblem XXXIII
Hermaphrodite lying in darkness needs fire
The Hermaphrodite, lying in darkness like a dead man, needs fire.
Emblem XXXVI
Emblem XXXVI
The Stone has been thrown on to the earth and lifted on to the mountains, and it dwells in the air and feeds in the river.
Emblem XLI
Emblem XLI
Adonis is killed by a boar, and Venus, rushing up to him, painted the roses red with her blood.
Emblem XLIV
Osiris killed and resurrected
Typhon kills Osiris by a ruse, and after that he scatters his limbs far and wide, but Is is gathers them together again.
Emblem XLVII
Emblem XLVII
The wolf coming from the East, and the Dog coming from the West, have bitten each other.
Emblem L
The Dragon kills the woman
The Dragon kills the woman, and she kills it, and together they bathe in blood.
Across the broader corpus 13
Plates from other emblem books tagged with nigredo-phase processes.
Aurora Consurgens
File:Aurora consurgens blackangel.jpg
Aurora Consurgens
File:Aurora consurgens zurich 042 f-20v-42 dragon-ring.jpg
Aurora Consurgens
File:Aurora consurgens zurich 060 f-29v-60 darkangel.jpg
Summa Perfectionis Magisterii
geberisphilosoph00gebe page 30
GEBER SUMMA — SOLUTION AND DISSOLUTION
Summa Perfectionis Magisterii
geberisphilosoph00gebe page 60
GEBER SUMMA — COAGULATION VESSEL
Summa Perfectionis Magisterii
geberisphilosoph00gebe page 70
Alchymia
bub_gb_0WfRikJt9yQC page 125
Rosarium Philosophorum (in De Alchimia Opuscula)
File:Der grüne Löwe, der Sol verschlingt.jpg
Rosarium Philosophorum (in De Alchimia Opuscula)
File:Lion devouring the sun.jpg
Splendor Solis
File:Splendor solis das grosse waschfest vor der stadt 1531.jpg
Splendor Solis
File:Splendor Solis. Image 10 - Severing the head of the King.jpg
Splendor Solis
File:Splendor Solis. Image 11 - Boiling the body in the vessel.jpg
Splendor Solis
File:Splendor Solis. Image 12 - Saturn - Dragon and child.jpg
Process tags 5
Click to see all images of each process across every emblem book.