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Lapis Lazuli Rings
Lapis lazuli is a gemstone of the kind
that might have come
straight out of the Arabian Nights: a deep blue with golden inclusions of
pyrites which shimmer like little stars.
This opaque, deep blue gemstone
has a grand past. It was among the first gemstones to be worn as jewellery and
worked on. At excavations in the ancient centres of culture around the
Mediterranean, archaeologists have again and again found among the grave
furnishings decorative chains and figures made of lapis lazuli – clear
indications that the deep blue stone was already popular thousands of years ago
among the people of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Persia, Greece and Rome. It is said that
the legendary city of Ur on the Euphrates plied a keen lapis lazuli trade as
long ago as the fourth millennium B.C., the material coming to the land of the
two great rivers from the famous deposits in Afghanistan. In other cultures,
lapis lazuli was regarded as a holy stone. Particularly in the Middle East, it
was thought to have magical powers. Countless signet rings, scarabs and figures
were wrought from the blue stone which Alexander the Great brought to Europe.
There, the colour was referred to as 'ultramarine', which means something like
'from beyond the sea'.
The euphonious
name is composed from 'lapis', the Latin word for stone, and
'azula', which comes from the Arabic and means blue. All right, so it's a blue
gemstone - but what an incredible blue! The worth of this stone to the world of
art is immeasurable, for the ultramarine of the Old Masters is nothing other
than genuine lapis lazuli. Ground up into a powder and stirred up together with
binding-agents, the marble-like gemstone can be used to manufacture radiant blue
watercolours, tempera or oil-paints. Before the year 1834, when it became
possible to produce this colour synthetically, the only ultramarine available
was that valuable substance made from genuine lapis lazuli that shines out at us
from many works of art today. Many pictures of the Madonna, for example, were
created using this paint. But in those days, ultramarine blue was not only
precious and so intense that its radiance outshone all other colours; it was
also very expensive. But unlike all other blue pigments, which tend to pale in
the light, it has lost none of its radiance to this very day. Nowadays, the blue
pigment obtained from lapis lazuli is mainly used in restoration work and by
collectors of historical paints.
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Commercially cut 10x14 oval of Peruvian material which doesn't have the intense blue of the Afghani lapis lazuli. Still,
this is a very nice ring and actually has quite a hefty bit of silver worked into it. Size 8˝
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Vivid blue 8x10 cabochon of brilliant Afghani lapis lazuli in a one-of-kind setting designed by me and placed atop a
size 8˝ handmade fancy split shank ring.
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