Knowra Chinese alchemy Chinese alchemy Chinese alchemy was a tradition of laboratory practices and theories about substances, bodily health, and transformation, pursued through both material experiments and contemplative disciplines.
Dao : The underlying way or ordering principle central to Daoist thought. Alchemy’s transformations were often understood as ways of aligning with the Dao.
Daoism : A Chinese religious and philosophical tradition centered on the Dao and practices of cultivation. Chinese alchemy developed in close exchange with Daoist ideas and communities.
Chinese medicine : Medical traditions developed in China using distinctive theories of the body, diagnosis, and treatment. Alchemical substances and theories circulated alongside medical practice and materia medica.
Waidan : External alchemy that used furnaces and mineral substances to prepare elixirs. It pursued transformation through prepared substances rather than primarily through bodily discipline.
Cinnabar : A red mercury sulfide mineral used as a pigment and as an alchemical ingredient. Its mercury-bearing nature made it a recurring material in elixir preparation.
Zhouyi Cantong Qi : An early Chinese text connecting alchemy, cosmology, and the changes described in the Book of Changes. It became a foundational source for later accounts of alchemical correspondences and practice.
Gunpowder : An explosive mixture of saltpeter, charcoal, and sulfur first developed in China. Experiments with alchemical ingredients contributed to its early discovery.
Neidan : Internal alchemy that recast bodily cultivation as a process of refining vital substances. It relocated the alchemical work from the furnace into the practitioner’s body and mind.
Jing, qi, and shen : A traditional Chinese framework of essence, vital energy, and spirit. Neidan describes cultivation through the refinement and transformation of these three treasures.
Ge Hong : A Chinese scholar of the fourth century who wrote extensively about Daoism, alchemy, and immortality. His Baopuzi preserves influential arguments for preparing external elixirs.
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