A ward scene showing three doctors consulting in the foreground, and surgeons carrying out an amputation (left) and a head operation (right). Paracelsus (Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, November 11 or December 17, 1493 - September 24, 1541) was a Swiss Renaissance physician, botanist, alchemist, astrologer, and general occultist. His motto was "Let no man belong to another who can belong to himself." He held a natural affinity with the Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Pythagorean philosophies central to the Renaissance. He devoted several sections of his writings to the construction of astrological talismans for curing disease, providing talismans for various maladies as well as talismans for each sign of the Zodiac. He pioneered the use of chemicals and minerals in medicine. He wandered Europe, Africa and Asia Minor, in the pursuit of hidden knowledge. He revised old manuscripts and wrote new ones. He died in 1541, at the age of 48, of natural causes. The movement of Paracelsianism was seized upon by many wishing to subvert the traditional Galenic physics, and his therapies became more widely known and used. Woodcut taken from the title page of Paracelsus' 'Opus Chyrurgicum', 1565.