Argyropoeia is the process of making silver from another metal, such as copper. Although gold-making or chrysopoeia is better known, silver making is widely practiced by alchemists from the early Alexandrians to the Renaissance and later.
Silver Recipes are from the Leyden Papyrus, c. 250 AD, originally written in Greek.
Silver and gold are the precious metals of the alchemical metallurgy corpus. They receive the name "noble metals" in the fourteenth century AD, referring to those not prone to oxidation. While silver eventually forms a patina, gold doesn't and is thus seen as the purest of metals.
Alchemy comes in part from the art of metal dyeing, based in ancient metallurgy. Metals can be colored gold or silver depending on the ingredients, and can be given a gold or silver coating. A test of metal quality in ancient times involves heating the metal.
Gold and silver both have a higher melt point than lead or tin, so colored lead turns to slush long before real silver. One favorite trick is encasing lead or tin in real gold or silver, so the outer layer proves pure by the melt test. The tester can't see the melted lead within.
Melt points
Gold: 1,064 °C (1947 °F)
Silver: 961.8 °C (1763 °F)
Lead: 327 °C (622 °F)
Tin: 232 °C (450 °F)
Manufacture of Silver
Method 1
"Plunge Cyprian copper, which is well worked and shingled for use, into dyer’s vinegar and alum and let soak for three days. Then for every mina of copper mix in 6 drachmas each of, earth of Chios, salt of Cappadocia and lamellose alum [iron alum / ammonium iron(III) sulfate], and cast ...
"... Cast skillfully, however, and it will prove to be regular silver. Place in it not more than 20 drachmas of good, unfalsified, proof silver, which the whole mixture retains and (this) will make it imperishable."
Earth of Chios is white mineral clay from the Isle of Chios in the North Aegean, often used in alchemical silver-making. Cyprian copper is from Cyprus, one of the leading copper supply sites since the Stone Age. Cappadocian salt comes from Tuz pink salt lake in Turkey.
Copper is sometimes a base and sometimes a noble metal. Its blue-green patina, verdigris, is especially desired as a pigment in the 18th century. Copper also binds well with certain metals, as it proves with bronze (88% copper, 12% tin).
Silver has the chemical symbol Ag, derived from the Latin argentum meaning 'silver.' This soft, white, and lustrous transition metal is valuable in business and religion. It's known to repel unwelcome bacteria, which spiritually translate as bad energy.
Method 2
"Purify white tin four times and melt together 6 parts of this and 1 mina of white Galatian copper [cupronickel, a copper/nickel alloy]; rub off and make what you wish. It will be silver of the first quality, except that the artisans can notice something (peculiar) about it because it is formed by the procedure mentioned."
Found in the Earth's crust at 0.05 parts per million, silver exists in its pure elemental form as native silver. It often forms valuable alloys like electrum (a mix of silver and gold, used to make the first coins) and combinations with other metals.
Silver is used for coinage, jewelry, and decorative items since ancient times. The shimmering appearance of silver has made it a popular choice for ornaments and tableware, reflecting its timeless appeal.
Method 3
"Galatian copper 1/2 part, silver, and ordinary tin, which the western Iberians among whom it is produced call bulla just as the Romans do. The copper is first melted, then the silver, and after two heatings, the tin. Then when the whole has become soft, remelt it many times and cool with brilliant earth [unknown], held in readiness, which is previously dissolved in spring water. Take out and quench the resulting lumps, heat them again, and indeed many limes, until very white silver comes from them. Remove them and shingle, rub and polish with talc, and work up the silver thus doubled. And tripling is done in the same way with the above-mentioned distribution of weights."
Most silver is produced as a byproduct of copper, gold, lead, and zinc refining. Silver has long been valued as a precious metal. While it is more abundant than gold, it is less abundant as a native metal.
As one of the seven metals of antiquity, silver has an enduring role in most human cultures. Silver is known in prehistoric times. It's one of the three metals of subgroup copper, silver, and gold, occurring in elemental form in nature.
Method 4
"Manufacture of Silver
Buy charcoal which the smiths use and soften it in vinegar one day. After that, take 1 ounce of copper, soak it thoroughly in alum, and melt it. After that, take 8 ounces of mercury but pour out the mercury thus measured into a secretion of poppy juice. Take also 1 ounce of silver. Put these materials together and melt; and when you have melted them, put the lumps so formed in a copper vessel with the urine of a pregnant animal and iron filing dust (for) 3 days. And the singular cloudiness which you will get on taking out is a sign of the natural fluctuation by which the mixture finds itself of equal composition by weight."
In Egypt, silver is more expensive than gold until c. 15th century BCE, when gold becomes currency subject to specific weights and measures. Early Egyptians separate gold from silver by heating the metals with salt. This produces silver chloride which is then reduced to silver.
Nitric acid dissolves silver and is used by early alchemists in aqua regia or Royal Water. Aqua regia is made by combining nitric acid (one part) and hydrochloric acid (three parts) and can dissolve gold and platinum as well.
Method 5
"Coloring in Silver
For silvering objects of copper: tin in sticks, 2 drachmas; mercury, 2 drachmas; earth of Chios, 2 drachmas. Melt the tin, throw on the crushed earth, then the mercury, and stir with an iron and fashion into globules."
Dissolving gold or silver seems to go contrary to the alchemist's purpose, but these metals can be refined by dissolution. The extracted precipitate is ideally more pure than the original gold or silver.
Aqua regia is a volatile or fuming liquid. When freshly made, aqua regia has no color, but it changes to yellow, orange, or red quickly due to the presence of nitrosyl chloride and nitrogen dioxide.
Method 6
"If you desire that the copper shall have the appearance of silver; after having purified the copper with care, place it in mercury and white lead; mercury alone suffices for coating it."
The same process with silver and nitric acid can also refine the metal. Nitric acid will dissolve silver and almost everything else, but not gold or platinum.
Silver Nitrate Crystallization
Silver compounds are dissolved in nitric acid to form a solution of silver nitrate, which is subsequently crystallized. By carefully controlling variables such as temperature and evaporation rate, silver nitrate crystals can be generated. These crystals are collected, dried, and subjected to additional processing to obtain pure silver.
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