1. SHAC AWARD SCHEME 2026
Remember the deadline is 31 May 2026 and application forms have to be requested in advance from grants@ambix.org . SHAC offers two types of award: support for research into the history of chemistry or history of alchemy by both new and independent scholars and support for Subject Development of either history of chemistry or history of alchemy.
Information from: https://www.ambix.org/grants/
2. THE PARTINGTON PRIZE 2026
SHAC is delighted to announce that the winner of the 2026 Partington Prize is Dr Flavio Bevacqua of University of Padua for the entry “Alchemy in 15th-Century Byzantium: The Case for the Role of Georgios-Gennadios Scholarios’ Circle”.
Flavio’s entry brings together for the first time two medieval texts in the history of alchemy, reconstructing the intellectual milieu surrounding the Byzantine scholar Georgios-Gennadios Scholarios. The author diligently and judiciously integrates manuscript evidence with philological analysis and cultural contextualization, illuminating a previously underexamined dimension of alchemical history in Byzantium. We congratulate Flavio Bevacqua for his groundbreaking work.
The Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry established the Partington Prize in memory of Professor James Riddick Partington, the Society’s first Chairman. It is awarded every three years for an original and unpublished essay on any aspect of the history of alchemy or chemistry. The prize-winning article will be published in the Society’s journal, Ambix, in 2026.
3. SHAC SPRING MEETING – REMEMBERING BILL BROCK: CHEMISTRY AND CULTURE 10 April 2026, Maison Française d’Oxford, 2-10 Norham Road, Oxford, OX2 6SE https://www.mfo.ac.uk/
This meeting is being held to commemorate the life, work and legacy of William Hodson Brock (1936-2025), who spent his entire career at the University of Leicester. Sometime chair of SHAC and editor of its journal Ambix, Brock was one of the leading historians of chemistry in his time, writing the Fontana/Norton History of Chemistry, as well as biographies of William Crookes, Justus von Liebig and Henry Edward Armstrong.
There is no charge for this meeting, but please let Frank James know, (frank.james@ucl.ac.uk) by 5 April 2026 if you wish to attend.
4. OXFORD SEMINARS IN THE HISTORY OF ALCHEMY AND CHEMISTRY – SPONSORED BY SHAC 13TH, 20TH MAY AND 3RD JUNE
Convenors: Ellen Hausner (Oxford), Sergei Zotov (Warburg), and Jo Hedesan (Oxford)
The meetings take place between 3 pm and 5 pm at the Maison Française d’Oxford, 2-10 Norham Road, Oxford, OX2 6SE. https://www.mfo.ac.uk/ There is no charge for these seminars and all are welcome to attend. No prior registration required.
13 May 2026
Session 1 — Life and Nature in Early Modern Alchemy
Chair: Sergei Zotov (Warburg Institute)
Oana Matei (Western University of Arad): Can Life Rise from Ashes? Discussions on the Possibility of the Palingenesis of Plants in the Seventeenth Century
Xinyi Wen (Warburg Institute): Cosmos or Coitus? A Copy Census of Oswald Croll’s Basilica Chymica, 1609–1690
20 May 2026
Session 2 — Spiritual Foundations of Alchemy
Chair: Ellen Hausner (Oxford)
Mark Edwards (Oxford): Ancient Alchemy as Philosophy
Charles Burnett (Warburg Institute): Alchemy as Divinatio
3 June 2026
Session 3 — Computational History of Alchemy and Chemistry
Chair: Rob Iliffe (Oxford)
Vojtěch Kaše (University of West Bohemia, Plzeň), and Sarah Lang (Max Planck Institute, Berlin): Tracing the Histories of Early Modern Conceptual Ecosystems: Remote Sensing Methods for the Archaeology of Alchemical Knowledge
Guillermo Restrepo (Max Planck Institute, Leipzig): Computational History of Chemistry: How Big Data Illuminates Macrohistorical Trends and Microhistorical Events