# Aurum potabile

*Drinkable gold*

**Known today as.** Gold dissolved or suspended in liquid for drinking.

Kind: Compound  
Poisoning: Mercury, arsenic, lead, and antimony (https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/poisons/heavy-metal)

## What was it used for?

A universal medicine, as its makers sold it, to comfort the heart and the vital spirits and to prolong life.

## What does modern science say?

Anthony claimed to make gold potable “without corrosives,” but at a trial at the College of Physicians in 1609 he failed to dissolve an ounce of gold, and by the process later printed as his the product could not contain any gold; whatever it did as a cordial was, in J. F. Payne’s view, possibly the work of ethers formed in the distillation and of the canary wine it was dissolved in.

## Pharmacognosy and toxicology

- **gold chloride**: if made by dissolving gold in aqua regia
- **colloidal gold**: if reduced, the purple of Cassius
- **the spirit and oils it was taken in**: 

**Mechanism.** Gold dissolves in aqua regia to chloroauric acid, and tin(II) chloride throws it down again as colloidal gold, the purple of Cassius; Anthony’s drinkable gold, by the process printed as his, held no gold at all. The real gold drugs came in the twentieth century: injected gold sodium thiomalate for rheumatoid arthritis after Forestier, and oral auranofin in the 1980s. Their side effects include rashes, kidney damage, and blood dyscrasias, and low-dose methotrexate has largely displaced them.

**Dose.** Anthony gave six grains of his “essence of gold” at a time in a contagious fever; by Payne’s account the product held no gold.

**Standing.** Attacked in its own day as counterfeit, in Cotta’s *Antiapology* (1623), yet a very popular remedy; auranofin, approved for rheumatoid arthritis in 1985, is now in a clinical trial against lung cancers.

## What lore surrounds it?

See [Gold leaf](https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/gold-leaf) and [Alchemy](https://thethinkingpress.org/inspirations/alchemy).

The quest outlived Anthony: Herman Boerhaave was drawn, in letters to J. B. Bassand of 1732 and 1733, into the search for “Gur,” an odd substance held to be the prime matter of metals, on the account of Alfonso-Goldfarb and Ferraz.

## What did the older authorities say?

**Francis Anthony.** By J. F. Payne’s account, the London chemical physician practised without the licence of the College of Physicians, was fined and imprisoned by it, and grew rich selling his secret remedy, aurum potabile.

## Sources

- Anthony, F. (1616). *Medicinae chymicae et veri potabilis auri assertio*.
- Payne, J. F. (1885). Anthony, Francis. In *Dictionary of National Biography* 2. London: Smith, Elder.
- Anthonie, F. (1616). *The Apologie, or Defence of a Verity Heretofore Published Concerning a Medicine Called Aurum Potabile*. London: John Legatt. Text Creation Partnership edition A20238.
- Alfonso-Goldfarb, A. M., & Ferraz, M. H. M. (2013). Gur, Ghur, Guhr or Bur? The quest for a metalliferous prime matter in early modern times. *British Journal for the History of Science* 46: 23–37.
- Wikipedia, “Aqua regia,” en.wikipedia.org (read 2 October 2026).
- Wikipedia, “Purple of Cassius,” en.wikipedia.org (read 2 October 2026).
- Wikipedia, “Sodium aurothiomalate,” en.wikipedia.org (read 2 October 2026).
- Wikipedia, “Auranofin,” en.wikipedia.org (read 2 October 2026).
- Kean, W. F., and Kean, I. R. L. (2008). “Clinical pharmacology of gold.” *Inflammopharmacology* 16.
- Principe, L. M. (2013). *The Secrets of Alchemy*. University of Chicago Press.

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*Aurum potabile.* In *Materia Medica*, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1, revised 2026-10-03. The Thinking Press. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/aurum-potabile

Historical description, not medical advice.