Despite the visual resemblance to lizards, salamanders (also known as newts) are classified as amphibians, sharing tadpole stages and skin respiration with their close cousins, frogs and toads. One of the coolest things about salamanders is their capacity for regeneration; they can regenerate entire limbs as well as damaged internal organs and have been the focus of many medical research projects in the modern world.

In the ancient world, salamanders were equally as intriguing. They were believed to have powerful magical properties and were key ingredients in many folk magic recipes. Even the three witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth used them in their famous concoctions:

“In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.”

Macbeth, Shakespeare

One reason salamanders were connected with magic is because many salamander species possess poisonous glands underneath the skin which they use as predatory defense. While the levels of toxicity between species varies, the most poisonous examples secrete tetrodotoxin, the powerful neurotoxin also found in pufferfish. The effects of Salamander poison were noted in the Alexipharmaca believed to be written in the 2^nd Century BCE, showing just how powerful the neurotoxins could be:

“But if hurt come from a draught, hard to cure, of the sorcerer’s lizard, slippery-skinned and utterly reckless, which they call the salamander, and which not even a fierce flame can harm, then on a sudden the base of the tongue is inflamed and then the victims are overcome with chill, and a fearful trembling burdens and loosens their joints. They stagger and crawl upon all fours like an infant, for the faculties of the mind are utterly blunted, and livid weals spreading thick over the skin blotch the extremities as the poison is diffused.”

Nicander, Alexipharmaca. trans A.S.F.Gow & A.F.Scholfield

Despite this, Salamanders were used in both medical and beauty concoctions as noted by the 1^st Century CE Greek physician, Pedanius Dioscorides. Considered to be the founder of modern Pharmacognosy (the scientific study of naturally occurring drugs and bioactive compounds from plants, animals, and minerals) Dioscorides included a few Salamander cures in his groundbreaking treatise, On Medical Matters:

“The salamander is a kind of lizard, lazy, variously spotted, in vain thought fireproof. It is antiseptic, ulcerating, and heating. They are mixed in antiseptic and leprosy medicines to the same benefit as cantharides and kept in store in a similar way. Moistened with oil they remove hair [depilatory]. They are disembowelled, the head and the feet taken away, and preserved in honey for the same uses.”  

On Medical Matters, Pedanius Dioscorides. Trans John Goodyer.

Salamanders were also connected with folk magic as they were thought of as one of the four elementary creatures in mythology and folklore. Surprisingly, despite their semi-aquatic nature and wet skin, salamanders were connected to the fire element instead of water. This is presumably because salamanders’ natural habitats often included fallen logs, so it is no wonder they were often tossed into fires by accident. It is believed that the mucus layer covering salamanders skin gave them enough protection to survive the initial shock and scurry away from the flames, giving support to the legend that they were born from flames and could survive fire.

In Aristotle’s The History of Animals he mentions the salamander in relation to animals that can be “found in substances that are usually supposed to be incapable of putrefaction” of which fire is one. He states that salamanders are both impervious to fire, but also that they can extinguish them:

“Now the salamander is a clear case in point, to show us that animals do actually exist that fire cannot destroy; for this creature, so the story goes, not only walks through the fire but puts it out in doing so.”

The History of Animals, Aristotle. Trans D’Arcy Wentworth Thompson.

If we consider that the salamander is a semi-aquatic animal and needs an environment with a high degree of moisture content then again, you can see how observable phenomena may have led to this connection. Any log that contained a salamander must have retained a significant amount of water for the creature to still be residing within it. If you place wet wood into a fire, chances are you will extinguish your fire – and so the legend grew.

The fire-resistant reputation of salamanders became a widespread belief and was considered factual due to its observable nature. Christian theologian such as St. Augustine were so certain that salamanders were impervious to fire that they used it as an argument to cement the existence of Hell. They reasoned that the Salamanders could provide living proof of the concept of eternal damnation; if salamander flesh can withstand fire and survive, then likewise, humans could suffer in lakes of hellfire without their flesh being destroyed:

“If, therefore, the salamander lives in fire, as naturalists have recorded, and if certain famous mountains of Sicily have been continually on fire from the remotest antiquity until now, and yet remain entire, these are sufficiently convincing examples that everything which burns is not consumed.”

City of God, St Augustine. Trans Marcus Dods.

The idea of Salamanders representing the fire element was revived again in the early 15^th century by the philosopher and alchemist Paracelsus. As one of the great thinkers and polymaths of the renaissance era, Paracelsus focused on the nature of substances and their artificial and natural transformations. He made great advancements in our understanding of chemistry, albeit given that he was an alchemist and theologian, he never abandoned his esoteric and spiritual bent. Paracelsus’ model of the 4 elements was captured in his work A Book on Nymphs, Sylphs, Pygmies, and Salamanders, and on the Other Spirits, where he symbolically attached Salamanders to fire, Gnomes to earth, Undines to water, and Sylphs to air.

One of the most fascinating pieces of salamander lore found in ancient times was associated with a curious relic called fire cleansed cloth. This literally meant the cloth was thrown in the fire to cleanse it. Miraculously this occurred without any destruction to the cloth itself, yet it also came out whiter and brighter than before with any dirt marks erased. While both rare and valuable, the cloth was in circulation throughout Asia and the Greco-Roman world, often in the form of napkins or tablecloths. This material also was commonly called Salamander cloth or Salamander wool, the assumption being that it came from these legendary fire-proof creatures.

 While the idea of fire cleansed cloth may sound farfetched, there is a logical explanation. This material was made from asbestos, which can be naturally found in the earth, extracted and woven into fiber (although very much not recommended given the heinous effects of asbestos dust on human lungs). Naturally occurring asbestos has a very fibrous nature, very different to most mineral substances. At that time, fibrous substances were always animal or vegetable, so it is no wonder they did not initially class asbestos as a mineral but assumed it was shed from an animal. Given that the salamander was also the only animal thought to be impervious to fire it is understandable that the two became connected.

On his adventures, Marco Polo discovered the truth when he came across men mining and processing asbestos into cloth. He recorded this encounter in his travel records noting:

“you must know that in the same mountain there is a vein of the substance from which Salamander is made. For the real truth is that the Salamander is no beast, as they allege in our part of the world, but is a substance found in the earth”.

“The substance of this vein was then taken and crushed, and when so treated it divides as it were into fibres of wool, which they set forth to dry. When dry, these fibres were pounded in a great copper mortar, and then washed, so as to remove all the earth and to leave only the fibres like fibres of wool. These were then spun, and made into napkins. When first made these napkins are not very white, but by putting them into the fire for a while they come out as white as snow. And so again whenever they become dirty they are bleached by being put in the fire.”

The Travels of Marco Polo, Marco Polo. Trans Sir Henry Yule.

While Marco Polo may have demystified the connection between fire cleansed cloth and salamanders, and the myth of salamander flesh being impervious to fire has been debunked, I always find it fascinating to unravel how these beliefs came to be. In this instance it is fascinating to walk through the application of myth applied to observational phenomena as a way of understanding. That said, modern scientists are still struggling to understand these little creatures’ miraculous capability to regenerate themselves and I think it is important to remember that we as humans are never at the end of our learning journey; there are always new mysteries waiting to be unraveled.