Alchemical phoenix

[Adam McLean]

Giovanni Aurelio Augurello.
Vellus aureum et chrysopoeia, seu chrysopoeia major et minor, das ist, Gülden-Vliess und Gold-erzielungs-Kungst.
Hamburg, 1716.

A phoenix sits on a bed of flaming coals, smoke and flames coming from its mouth.
On its tail is depicted a figure surrounded by books. 
A naked soul-form (Sophia?) with winged heels rises up towards a Zeus-like figure with thunderbolts, who stands above the clouds beside the sun in a radiant nimbus of light.


Das endt ist gleich den Ursprungs Grunden
Das kan der Frey-Geist hie nicht finden.

Diss Reist bladt zeiget an
Wast die Sophia kan

Ich Phoenix bin, und bleibe aschen;
Dar feur wird mich nicht anders waschen.


   

[Carl Lavoie]

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That figure sitting on the tail is really intriguing. Brandishing a double-edge sword and the tables of the Law (symbols of the New and Old Testaments, or a religious version of the allegory of Justice?…), wearing the papal tiara but clad in worldly, secular clothes, and sitting backwards on a dragon, like a male 'Whore of Babylon'.
 
Wouldn’t be the first time an alchemical publication is layered with religious pamphleteering.
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