Homunculus: The Alchemical Creation of Little People with Great Powers.
A homunculus is a representation of a small human being. Popularized in sixteenth-century alchemy and nineteenth-century fiction, it has historically referred to the creation of a miniature, fully formed human.
The first known account of the production of the homunculus is said to be found in an undated Arabic work called the “Book of the Cow”, purportedly written by the Greek philosopher Plato himself. The materials required for the creation of the homunculus include human semen, a cow or ewe and animal blood, whilst the process includes the artificial insemination of the cow / ewe, smearing the inseminated animal’s genitals with the blood of another animal, and feeding it exclusively on the blood of another animal. The pregnant animal would eventually give birth to an unformed substance, which would then be placed in a powder made of ground sunstone (a mystical phosphorescent elixir), sulphur, magnet, green tutia (a sulphate of iron) and the sap of a white willow. When the blob starts growing human skin, it would be required to be placed in a large glass or lead container for three days. After that, it has to be fed with the blood of its decapitated mother for seven days before becoming a fully-formed homunculus.
The 16th century alchemist Paracelsus, provides a different recipe for creating the homunculus in his work, “De Natura Rerum”. This recipe uses a horse as the surrogate mother of the homunculus, and the semen of a man is left inside the animal’s womb to putrefy for forty days, before a little man is born. Rather than using the homunculus to perform magical feats, Paracelsus instructs that the homunculus ought to be “educated with the greatest care and zeal, until it grows up and begins to display intelligence”. Paracelsus also claims that the procedure for making the homunculus is one of the greatest secrets revealed by God to mortals, perhaps suggesting that the creation of artificial life is divine wisdom that may be used by human beings.
Scientists today dismiss the work prescribed by the “Book of the Cow” and “De Natura Rerum” as mere fantasy, while others suggest the writing was intended to be taken symbolically, rather than literally, and contains hidden messages regarding the process of spiritual ascension. Nevertheless, the goal of producing the homunculus, i.e. the creation of artificial life, is a quest that some are still pursuing today.