Protective gems and metals
Stones and metals are among the oldest materials of amulets. The coral hung around the necks of Roman children, the amber necklaces of the women of the Po valley, the iron nailed above doors and the jade of Chinese burials all tell of an idea shared by many cultures: that matter itself, through its colour, its hardness or its mysterious origin, could hold a protective power. This section traces the history of gems and metals believed to be protective, from rock crystal to meteorites, from turquoise to the bezoar stone, following the sources that handed down these beliefs: the Natural History of Pliny the Elder, the lapidaries of Damigeron and Evax, the Liber lapidum of Marbod of Rennes, the De mineralibus of Albertus Magnus and the Lapidary of Alfonso X. The virtues attributed to stones are presented as evidence of tradition, not as real properties: what matters is their place in the history of culture.
Coral: from Medusa's blood to childhood amulets
Red coral in the myth of Perseus, in Pliny, in medieval lapidaries and in fifteenth-century painting: the history of a Mediterranean amulet.
Amber: the tears of the Heliades and the Baltic route
Amber between the myth of Phaethon, Pliny's scepticism, the workshops of Aquileia and the birth of the word electricity: the story of a fossil resin.
Jade: the stone of virtues from China to Mesoamerica
Nephrite and jadeite among Chinese bi discs, Han jade burial suits, Maya masks and the Spanish name piedra de ijada: a history of jade.
Protective iron: nails, horseshoes and touching iron
From the nail driven into the temple of Jupiter to the legend of Saint Dunstan and cold iron against fairies: iron in European protective beliefs.
Silver, metal of the moon and of purity
Silver in lunar alchemy, the five-fingered hand of the Maghreb, the Neapolitan cimaruta and the late legend of the silver bullet against werewolves.
Incorruptible gold: from the Roman bulla to the Orphic tablets
Gold as the flesh of the gods in Egypt, the bulla of Roman boys and the inscribed tablets of initiates: the metal of the Sun in ancient traditions.
Haematite, the blood stone in seals and magical gems
Haematite from Theophrastus and Pliny to Babylonian cylinder seals, Egyptian amulets and Roman magical gems: the history of the blood stone.
Tiger's eye: a modern stone with an ancient reputation
Tiger's eye between mineralogy, nineteenth-century South African deposits and the ancient symbolism of stone eyes: what the sources really say.
Onyx and agate: banded stones in the Bible, cameos and lapidaries
Onyx and agate in Exodus, in the great ancient cameos, in Pliny and in Marbod's Liber lapidum: two chalcedonies with opposite reputations.
Turquoise: from the mines of Sinai to the horseman's amulet
Turquoise between Hathor, lady of turquoise, the mines of Nishapur, the belief about falls from horseback and Aztec mosaics: the story of a stone.
Garnet and carbuncle: red stones that glow like embers
The carbuncle of Theophrastus and Pliny, the shining stone of Noah's ark and the garnets of Sutton Hoo: the history of red gems held to be protective.
Rock crystal, the eternal ice of the ancients
Rock crystal in Pliny, in Frankish graves, in medieval reliquaries and among the Renaissance tools of vision: the history of the purest quartz.
Jet: the black stone from Whitby to Santiago de Compostela
Jet in the pages of Pliny and Bede, among the azabacheros of Compostela, in the fig hand against the evil eye and in Victorian mourning jewellery.
The bezoar stone, the supposed antidote of European courts
The bezoar from the Persian pad-zahr to the Habsburg Kunstkammern, Ambroise Paré's experiment and the Goa stones: the story of a false antidote.
Meteorites: stones fallen from the sky between cult and science
From the Egyptian iron of heaven to the stone of Cybele, from the Ensisheim fall of 1492 to the work of Chladni and Biot: a history of meteorites.
Pliny the Elder and the book of gems in the Natural History
The thirty-seventh book of the Natural History: method, anecdotes, scepticism towards magicians and the medieval legacy of the first encyclopedia of gems.
Damigeron, Evax and the Greek lapidaries of late antiquity
The De lapidibus of Damigeron and Evax, the Orphic Lithika and other Greek lapidaries: the texts that passed the magical virtues of stones to the Middle Ages.
Marbod of Rennes and the Liber lapidum, the most read lapidary
The life of Marbod, bishop of Rennes, and the fortune of his Liber lapidum: sixty stones in Latin hexameters, from Evax as source to vernacular versions.
Albertus Magnus and De mineralibus: stones between science and virtue
Albertus Magnus's De mineralibus: the alphabetical lapidary, the theory of virtues, visits to mines and the spurious books of secrets attributed to him.
The Lapidary of Alfonso X: stones, stars and signs of the zodiac
The Lapidary translated from Arabic for Alfonso X the Wise: three hundred and sixty stones for the degrees of the zodiac and the illuminated Escorial codex.