for both the most sought after among precious stones was not diamonds,
rubies, sapphires, or emeralds; it was lapis lazuli. Today lapis lazuli is con-
sidered a semi-precious stone, but among the ancients, there was nothing
“semi”about it. Lapis ranged in color from violet to green, with thefinest
quality being a rich azure blue. It had no real utilitarian value but was
thought to represent the powers of both divinity and royalty and was used
for ritual and ceremonial purposes. It has been recovered in the remains of
temples and palaces as well as from hoards and elite graves with one shaft
burial containing 500 beads. Lapis was prized for prestige reasons, and for
personal adornment it was cut in numerous ways and often set in gold.
Jewelry included necklaces, pendants, beads, discs, and amulets representing
various animals ranging from bulls to frogs. It was also made into hair
combs, dagger handles, and seals, depicting scenes from mythology or con-
taining cuneiform writing, and used as veneer for boxes, boards, and bowls
as well as inlay for eyes, eyebrows, and beards in anthropomorphic sculpture.
It was the stuff of gods.
Lapis lazuli is a mineral composed of sodium silicate containing sulfur. A
product of metamorphism, it is formed in crystalline limestone. When clas-
sical authors referred to sapphires, they meant lapis. If obsidian andflint
represented an older trade, lapis and other semi-precious stones such as car-
nelian, turquoise, and agate were thefirst luxury trade. Archaeologists use
lapis as an important marker for determining trade routes. Metals were
melted down or could corrode, but lapis had a high survival rate because
beads were usually too small to be reworked. And unlike other valuable
stones, lapis had a unique source.
Lapis lazuli occurs naturally in very few places worldwide. The closest to
the ancient centers of civilization was in Badakhstan in the snowy mountains
of northeastern Afghanistan 1,500 miles as the crowflies from Mesopotamia
and twice that far over the circuitous routes traders actually traveled. From
the beginning of the trade, four small mines in Badakhstan have been the
only source for lapis from India to Greece. The mines, which ranged in ele-
vation from 6,000 to 17,000 feet, were connected to the outside world by
little trails that were snowbound much of the year. The stone was quarried
in the most primitive of ways. Wood was carried in on the backs of donkeys
and afire built at the rock face. Once it was sufficiently heated, cold water
was splashed on the rock to crack it. The lapis was then chipped out by pick,
hammer, and chisel.
Lapisfirst appeared in northern Mesopotamia in the form of beads at the
end of thefifth millenniumBCEalthough it did not become abundant until
the middle of the fourth. From northern Mesopotamia lapis was passed on to
Syria and Egypt and by the end of the millennium was being deposited
as grave goods as far away as Nubia. Lapis did not become evident in
Sumer until about 3100 BCE,reflecting the dominance of northern
Mesopotamia as the hub of international trade routes during much of the
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