page_title: Filius philosophorum
hierarchical_section_title: Filius philosophorum
caption_attribution_description: Emblem XLIX (titled "Infans Philosophicus tres agnoscit patres, ut Orion") from the Michael Maier 's Atalanta fugiens, a Latin emblem book printed in Germany. The emblem represents an allegory of the conception of Orion as the "child of philosophy". The fathers are (left to right) Apollo, Vulcan and Mercury conceiving in a ox hide. The artist stands to the left, and Mars to the right. (see excerpted commentary from Stanislas Klossowski de Rola’s The Golden Game: Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century)
context_page_description: The filius philosophorum is a symbol in alchemy. In some texts it is equated with the philosopher's stone, but in others it assumes its own symbolic meanings. Other terms for the filius philosophorum include filius sapientiae, infans noster, infans solaris, infans lunaris, and infans solaris lunaris.
  There are several images that have been used to represent the filius philosophorum. Among these are the transformed hermaphroditic Hermes, the child of the Red King and the White Queen, the child of the egg, and the three-fathered Orion.
  The filius philosophorum was also one of the Jungian archetypes analyzed by the Swiss psychologist.
context_section_description: The filius philosophorum (Latin for "the philosophers' child", i.e. made by the true students of philosophy) is a symbol in alchemy.  In some texts it is equated with the philosopher's stone (lapis philosophorum), but in others it assumes its own symbolic meanings.  Other terms for the filius philosophorum include filius sapientiae ("child of wisdom"), infans noster ("our child"),  infans solaris ("sun child"), infans lunaris ("moon child"), and infans solaris lunaris ("sun moon child").
  There are several images that have been used to represent the filius philosophorum.  Among these are the transformed hermaphroditic Hermes, the child of the Red King and the White Queen (the Sun and Moon), the child of the egg, and the three-fathered Orion.
  The filius philosophorum was also one of the Jungian archetypes analyzed by the Swiss psychologist.
caption: The conception of the philosophical child, allegorized as the conception of Orion by three fathers.
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