A method for the separation and recovery of elemental sulfur from mixtures of foreign material and sulfur which comprises washing the foreign material and sulfur mixture to remove impurities which are deleterious to coalescence of the sulfur particles followed by adding as a cleansing and coalescence agent an alkali metal hydroxide or carbonate, heating the mixture to a temperature above the melting point of sulfur for one hour to coalesce the sulfur particles, and separating the coalesced sulfur from the foreign material.