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For the #printerSolstice2425 prompt sodium, my #linocut of Marie Meudrac (c. 1610-1680), a woman in science right at the transition between alchemy & chemistry. Born to a land-owning family, she moved to the Château de Grosbois after marrying, where she became good friends with Countess de Guiche. She wrote ‘La Chymie Charitable et Facile, en Faveur des Dames’ [Easy Charitable Chemistry for Ladies]. She had her own lab where she tested all 
her remedies & recipes. The book is dedicated to the countess; she had access to a high temperature furnace which required permission of the king which she might have got thanks to her. The word “chymie” comes from 16th century Swiss doctor Paracelsus, & following in his tradition, she believed that matter is made of various quantities of 3 elements: salt, mercury, & sulphur, but unlike previous alchemist authors her writing is clear rather than obscure. She had been keeping notes 2/n
of all her experiments & realized she had enough for a book. She wrote about her uncertainty in daring to publish as a woman but concludes that but minds “have no sex and that if the minds of women were cultivated like those of men, and that if as much time and energy were used to instruct the minds of the former, they would equal those of the latter.” Knowing that bourgeois or even aristocratic women were denied formal scientific education in universities, she wanted to provide accessible 3/n
chemistry, botany, pharmacology, medicine, as well as in cosmetics knowledge & hands-on training to women. As women could not legally practice medicine, providing free healing services & lessons was a sort of loophole for her. She covered items such as lab techniques, properties of medicines, & cosmetics. She also had a table of weights & 106 alchemical symbols that were used in medicine at the time. 4/5
The jars behind are marked with these symbols, including the circle with horizontal crossbar, for salt (NaCl).
https://minouette.etsy.com/listing/1876859281
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