philosopher's stone
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.61 in modern English
27
Scrabble Score
17
Letters
4
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A supposed substance able to turn base metals, such as lead or mercury, into gold or silver, also sometimes claimed to cure any illness (as panacea) or confer immortality (as elixir of life), among other functions.
noun
Alternative letter-case form of philosopher's stone.
Example Sentences
- "Men talke much […] of the Philoſophers ſtone, that it turneth copper into gold; […]"
- "[…] I entered with the greatest diligence into the search of the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life."
- "1997, Christopher McIntosh, The Rosicrucians: The History, Mythology, and Rituals of an Esoteric Order, Weiser Books, 3rd Revised Edition, 1998, Paperback, page 51, The Rosicrucianism of the Andreae era was only partly concerned with alchemy, but later revivals of the Rosicrucian idea were to lay great stress on their claims to possess the secrets of transmutation and the knowledge of the Philosopher's Stone or the Elixir of Life."
- "The Cleopatra of this early alchemical dialogue is not the famous Cleopatra VII (69-30 BC), last queen of the Ptolemy dynasty and lover of Mark Antony. Along with Mary Prophetess and Zosimos's Theosebia, this Cleopatra occupies a high place in alchemical lore as one of very few ancient female adepts who possessed the secret of the philosopher's stone."
Etymology
A misconstruction of philosophers' stone, from Middle English philosophres ston, a calque of Latin lapis philosophōrum.