Silver
Argentum
The metal of the moon.
Silver: what does it mean in analytical psychology?
Silver belongs to the moon as gold to the sun, and to the white stage of the work, the albedo. Jung read it with Luna as the reflective, receptive, feminine light: the clarity that mirrors rather than blazes.
Silver: where does it appear in myth and tradition?
The silver moon, the thirty pieces of silver, the silver bough and the silver cord, the mirror’s silver backing.
From the Sources
Redgrove describes silver as a beautiful metal that wears well in a pure atmosphere and resists fire, but is attacked by certain corrosives.
“Silver, on the other hand, is, indeed, a beautiful metal which wears well in a pure atmosphere and resists the action of fire; but it is attacked by certain corrosives”
H. Stanley Redgrove, Alchemy: Ancient and Modern, Chapter II, § 22. Second and revised edition; London: William Rider & Son, Ltd., 1922 (first published 1911) (Project Gutenberg eBook #43240). The text, read in part
The Britannica records that the alchemists named silver Luna or Diana and marked it with the crescent moon, a name that survives in 'lunar caustic'.
“The alchemists named it Luna or Diana, and denoted it by the crescent moon; the first name has survived in lunar caustic, silver nitrate.”
Encyclopædia Britannica, eleventh edition: Silver, 'Silver', opening paragraph. The 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, as transcribed on Wikisource. The text, read in part
Each passage is quoted from the text named, which the press fetched and read, and was checked word for word against a fresh copy of it; the link opens that copy. Passages are given as printed, without the editors’ footnote numbers, and with words broken across lines joined.
In the Materia Medica
Silver: the substance itself, as the old medicine used it and as it is known today.
Where to Read
- “Luna,” in Mysterium Coniunctionis, CW 14
Jung’s writings are cited by the volume of the Collected Works (CW), Bollingen Series / Princeton, 1953–79.
Related Symbols
In the Glossary: Albedo.
Also among Metals, Principles, and Substances
“Learn as much as you can about symbolism; then forget it all when you are analysing a dream.”
Cite This Entry
“Silver.” In Symbols of the Psyche, the Symbolarium. The Thinking Press, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/symbolarium/psyche/silver.
Symbols That Share Its Terms
Rain (Dew) · The Dew (Ros, the heavenly moisture) · The Bird · The Dove · The Swan (Cygnus)
Nearby in the alphabet: The Seven: The number of the planets, the days, and the stages. The Shadow: The side of the personality one does not wish to be. The Skull: Death remembered, and what outlasts the flesh. Solutio: Dissolved back into the waters.