page_title: Hieros gamos
section_title: Alchemy and Jungian psychology
hierarchical_section_title: Hieros gamos / Alchemy and Jungian psychology
caption_attribution_description: English: Illustration of "fermentation" in the Rosarium philosophorum (Frankfurt, 1550) [1] [2]
context_page_description: Hieros gamos or Hierogamy is a sacred marriage that plays out between a god and a goddess, especially when enacted in a symbolic ritual where human participants represent the deities.
  The notion of hieros gamos does not always presuppose literal sexual intercourse in ritual, but is also used in purely symbolic or mythological context, notably in alchemy and hence in Jungian psychology. Hieros gamos is described as the prototype of fertility rituals.
context_section_description: The hieros gamos is one of the themes that Carl Jung dealt with in his book Symbols of Transformation.
caption: Depiction of the fermentatio stage as hieros gamos, woodcut from the 16th century Rosary of the Philosophers.
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