Women in Early Modern Science

Antonio Neri, 1598-1600,
MS Ferguson 67, f. 25r.

Within a year of his ordination in the Catholic Church, Antonio Neri began an ambitious treatise, illustrated in his own hand, devoted to "all of alchemy." Six of the illustrations in this manuscript, completed in 1600, show women tending equipment. What is remarkable is that, in the historical record, female participation in alchemy is otherwise extremely rare. 

Two pictures show female alchemists at work. In both cases, the

Antonio Neri, 1598-1600, 
MS Ferguson 67, f. 35r.

technician stands behind a dedicated piece of apparatus, facing forward, giving the impression of propriety in an arranged portrait. The first drawing depicts a furnace and vessels used to make liquid mercury from its ore. The other shows a different type of furnace with a 'tower,' used as an efficient way to cook ceruse (white lead oxide). These images are part of a larger set of two dozen similar drawings that each illustrate the equipment used to prepare a specific product, many include a furnace and glassware. Nine of these show a single individual, (or in one case two men) tending the equipment. 

Three other illustrations in the manuscript are notable for their

Antonio Neri, 1598-1600, 
MS Ferguson 67, f. 37r.

engagement of women. These pictures show details of kitchen and nursing work; what might be termed more traditional female roles in the sixteenth century. Two of these illustrations are devoted to the respective arts of preparing plants and animals. They show women working alongside men performing various tasks. A third illustration shows medicinal fogging tents tended by a woman. Inside one tent, a male patient sits on a bench, exposed and breathing fumes pumped in by a large vessel perched over a fire.

These images also present clues to the circumstances of Antonio Neri's work environment. We may well be looking at operations inside the Casino di San Marco soon after prince Don Antonio de' Medici's occupation of the facility. The presence of women among Neri’s colleagues indicates a social setting with a camaraderie not displayed in other alchemical works of the period.