2" Natural Blue Lapis Lazuli Worry Palm Stone Pyrite Crystal Calcite Mineral

Location: Afghanistan

Weight: 1.3 Ounces  

Dimensions: 2 Inches Long, 1.6 Inches Wide, 0.4 Inches Thick

The item pictured is one you will receive.  

Hardness: 5.5

Lapis Lazuli is not a single mineral. It is a combination of lazurite, calcite, and pyrite, with small amounts of other minerals.  Contrary to common belief, it does not contain lazulite. Lapis Lazuli literally means "blue stone" from Latin and Persian or Arabic. 

Historians believe the connection between humans and lapis lazuli dates back over 6,500 years. The gem was highly valued by ancient civilizations such as Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Greece, and Rome. They admired it for its vibrant, beautiful color and considered it as precious as other blue stones like sapphire and turquoise.

Badakshan, a province in present-day Afghanistan, is a forbidding wasteland of mountains, bare of any vegetation. The sheer mountain faces rise as high as 17,000 feet and are scored with treacherous ravines. Humans make their way there to seek one thing only: the azure treasure that is fine lapis lazuli.

 The same was true as far back as 700 BC when the region was part of a country known as Bactria. The lapis mines that were producing then are still producing today. They are, in fact, the world’s oldest known commercial gemstone sources.

Merchant caravans transported their precious blue cargo across Bactria, on their way to the great cities of the ancient Greeks, Indians, Egyptians, Mesopotamians, and Persians. Marco Polo referred to the area’s lapis mines in 1271, but few outsiders have seen them because of their inhospitable location.