Mystical systems
Rebis
Direct answer
Rebis: The rebis, from the Latin res bina or double thing, is the two-headed, two-sexed figure that pictures the union of opposites at the close of the alchemical work.
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At a glance
- Also called
- alchemical hermaphrodite, alchemical androgyne
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Solve et Coagula, Rubedo, Magnum Opus, Individuation
The rebis, from the Latin res bina or double thing, is the two-headed, two-sexed figure that pictures the union of opposites at the close of the alchemical work.
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What does rebis mean?
Rebis means double thing. Alchemists taught that the work joined two contrary principles, called sulphur and mercury, sun and moon, king and queen. The result of that marriage was drawn as one body with two heads, one male and one female, often crowned, winged, or standing on a dragon.
The figure is a diagram and not a portrait of anything seen. It states that the finished matter holds both natures at once, fixed and volatile, hot and cold. Jung read it as an image of the self that has stopped disowning its opposite half, and gave a whole study to the series of woodcuts in which it appears.
On the tree of the hidden arts: Alchemy.
What sets Rebis apart
The rebis is a product and not a process: it shows the state reached once the conjunction has been made and has survived a death. In the picture series it never appears at the first meeting of king and queen but only after the joined body has lain in the tomb and been revived. Its attributes are those of rule over both natures, a crown, wings, and beneath its feet the dragon or the paired sun and moon.
- Latin: res bina, double thing or twofold matter
- Form: one body, two heads, one male and one female
- Key source: Rosarium philosophorum, Frankfurt, 1550
- Common attributes: crown, wings, dragon underfoot, compass and square
- Jung's study: The Psychology of the Transference, 1946
Often mistaken for something else: The chemical wedding is the act of joining the king and queen; the rebis is the single being that results from it.
The story behind Rebis
The term is found in medieval Latin alchemy. The Rosarium philosophorum, printed at Frankfurt in 1550, shows a king and queen who meet, lie together, die and rise as one crowned double figure. A much reproduced engraving of the early seventeenth century shows the rebis holding a compass and a square. Jung based The Psychology of the Transference (1946) on the Rosarium pictures.
Why Rebis matters
Rebis is the clearest picture of what alchemists meant by the conjunction of opposites, the hinge of the entire work.
How to read Rebis
Readers of emblems look for it as the sign that a series of images has reached union; in reflection it frames the question of what one's two halves are.
Rebis in practice: an example
Someone who has always been either the dutiful one or the rebel might take the rebis as a picture of holding both without choosing a side.
Where readings of Rebis go wrong
Rebis is a symbol of joined principles in a substance or a psyche, and says nothing about any person's body or identity.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- rebis alchemy, rebis meaning, alchemical hermaphrodite, alchemical androgyne
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
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Common questions
What does rebis mean?
It comes from the Latin res bina, double thing or twofold matter. It names the product of the alchemical marriage of opposites, pictured as a single body with two heads.
Why does the rebis have two heads?
The heads stand for the two principles the work unites, usually shown as male and female, sun and moon. One body with both heads says the two have become a single substance.
Where can the rebis be seen?
In the woodcuts of the Rosarium philosophorum of 1550 and in many seventeenth-century alchemical engravings, which are widely reproduced in books on alchemy.
