Mary the Jewess, Maria the Jewess or Mary the Prophetess is considered the world's first alchemist. Working in Alexandria, Egypt, she's acclaimed by Zosimos of Panopolis writing at least a century later. Mary is highly respected in the field of alchemy.
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Mary is best known through works of Zosimos of Panopolis (c. 300 CE) and other alchemists and writers over the years. She has numerous inventions to her credit. Later scientists consider her the first true alchemist of the Western World.
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Alchemy is based on the older science of metallurgy. Mary incorporates animistic qualities, such as bodies, souls, and spirits into her descriptions of metal. She believes metals have different genders, and by joining genders together a new element or entity can be created.
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Zosimos of Panopolis calls Mary 'one of the sages'. He writes of Mary living in the past or having past lives. In one of these she journeyed to Egypt, a land with a long alchemic history, at the time of Pericles (5th century BCE or c. 600 years before she was born).
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Mary's listed by the 10th century Arabian directory Kitāb al-Fihrist as one of the 52 most famous alchemists. Arabs know her as the Daughter of Plato. In Western alchemical texts, the term Daughter of Plato is used for white sulfur.
The text also states she knows how to prepare caput mortuum (lit. dead head), a purple pigment. The pigment comes from a type of hematite, a magnetic stone high in iron.
She writes in Greek, Latin and Arabic, often describing the union of opposites:
"Join the male and the female, and you will find what is sought."
Author of Atalanta Fugiens (1618) Michael Maier names Mary the Jewess as one of four women who knew how to make the Philosopher's Stone, including Cleopatra the Alchemist, Medera and Taphnutia. Cleopatra may be a pseudonym for a group of anonymous writers.
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Her inventions include the tribikos, the kerotakis and the bain-Marie, which bears her name. The tribikos is a vessel with three arms to separate distillation products. The keratakis is used to heat substances and collect vapors.
The bain-Marie limits the maximum temperature of a container and contents to the boiling point of a separate liquid. It functions as a double boiler. Mary's inventions are still in use today.
The Axiom of Maria is a precept in alchemy
"One becomes two, two becomes three, and out of the third comes the one as the fourth."