This paper historicizes a constellation of interrelated ideas regarding the chymical principles as they developed and became resilient fixtures within a major chymical tradition. Focusing primarily on German chymists, several of whom have eluded sustained historical interest, it explores how experimental analysis was generally thought to produce sensible chymical principles, often conceived as principiata: bodies produced by combining or mixing fundamental elements or principles. These principiata allowed for the establishment of hierarchies of increasingly complex compounds and helped to define the most fundamental components of matter. Chymists’ ability to separate tangible substances that were believed to be fundamental was considered so central to the chymical enterprise that it came to define or delimit chymistry itself and was often used to attack groups perceived as overly speculative or less empirical. This chymical tradition, which included Paracelsus as well as figures such as Andreas Libavius, Daniel Sennert, and Georg Ernst Stahl, significantly influenced later chemistry. Its approach to hierarchies of combinatorial principles was integral to the concept of chemical compounds and the delineation of chemistry as an autonomous discipline.