Where did gemcutting get its start?
What are the origins of the ancient and honorable craft known as lapidary? Gemcutting, or lapidary, occurred as the most likely answer suggests that an offshoot of more mundane strivings. A stone may have fallen into a fire where the heat caused it to break or flake. Perhaps a sharp edge resulted? Certainly, flint and other hard stone possess sharp edges, but a blade-like cutting edge on a newly flaked piece meant something else.
Then perhaps, someone viewed stone fragments from a more abstract perspective. To regard the unusual configuration, texture, or coloring of a piece of stone or mineral crystal, to contemplate the possible alterations of a stone so as to wring from it the promise of greater beauty is to begin to understand the mysteries of lapidary.
In prehistoric times, man hammered out his tools of stone, presumably smacking one stone against another, scratched and chiseled out symbols and primitive writings on hard rock and cave walls - and gradually learned the great secret: some stones are harder, i.e., they are more capable of inflicting scratches on other less hard stones.
From such an understanding, drilling and bruting became possible. Drilling, one of the first of the lapidary arts, shows itself in history as far back as 6,000 years ago. In these same times, the primitive peoples learned that rocks could be broken or fractured. First, the breakage provided random fragments, but ultimately experimentation no doubt demonstrated that breakage could also be achieved with some semblance of control.
This same knowledge of relative hardness led to bruting, the shaping of a gem specimen through rubbing against another harder mineral type. The slow, tedious practice of bruting was used for centuries until more refined techniques were introduced.
At this early date, historians are reluctant to attribute anything quite so intellectual as an understanding of cleavages. It was satisfactory that the breaking, chipping, or flaking of a stone could be disciplined...made to occur in desired directions and depth.
River Rolling Produces a Smooth Finish
No doubt, too, man compared the smooth, river and stream rolled stones with those found elsewhere. Even here, it required no great stretch of thinking to conclude that something was exerting a smoothing or polishing effect on certain stones. Could it be other mineral particles in the river working to complement the action of the constantly running water? From such questions, the advance to a rubbing paste of water and sand was virtually inevitable.
Whether many of these later discoveries broke in the Paleo or Neolithic, (early or late Stone Age,) is of little consequence. What is known is that man used the new found phenomena in anticipation of the many tools and pieces of equipment of succeeding years.
By 3,000 B. C., man had developed his lapidary skills to such a level that cylinders made of serpentine, were commonplace. The Scanning Electron Microscope has analyzed many seals of the early Bronze Age that were uncovered in ancient Mesopotamia. Showing remarkable skill and tool control by the gemcutters, these seals were often shaped to form a flat or convex seal face with a raised perforated handle on the back.
Highly valued, the seals were worn as amulets that could be removed quickly and pressed into a clay tablet. Indeed, they were the mark of early man as each seal was an individual creation, made exclusively for its owner.
Old Tools Show Age of Lapidary
What is so inspiring about these ancient artifacts is that they prove how old lapidary is. They show that, well before Christ, lapidaries had pretty much conquered the challenges of sawing, chipping, drilling, polishing and, yes, faceting. By today's standards, the work was rudimentary but the principals upon which this work was performed are still with us.
From the beginning of recorded history, use of jade and jade look-alikes were prevalent. Materials like serpentine only look like jade, but the real value lies in the lapidary skill lavished on the original rough.
Centuries before Christ, the Chinese knew how to work the tough green material they called yu and which we call jade. It was also a sacred stone to the Aztecs of North America as well as the Maoris of New Zealand. The tribes of the Swiss Lake District also worked jade.
To be sure, pre-Columbian beads of Mexico and South America were crudely worked samples of jade, but some of the more advanced cultures of ancient Mexico worked the material into incredibly intricate and complex carvings. Where available, other forms of jade were also used extensively. These other similar appearing by non-jade types included serpentine, prehnite, and aventurine.
Naturally, the various kinds of quartz found quick favor among stone workers. They represented an explosion of varied, rich colors and, although their hardness made them a more difficult to work than the softer stones, many different cultures sought them not for their lush cosmetic values but for mystic purposes as well.
The faceted gems of today are incredible optical performers. It has always been that way. For example, the marvelous translucency and transparency of the crystalline quartzes ranged from carnelian, sardonyx, agate, amethyst to rock crystal. The early Chinese, Japanese, Grecian, and Mycenaean peoples found quartz a marvelous mineral for gemcutting, as did the craftsmen of India and Scotland.
Amber Still Considered Earliest Gem Materials
Amber is undoubtedly one of the earliest stones to be used in jewelry. It is lightweight, easily drilled, and features a pleasing warm color. It was also found floating in numerous parts of the world in fairly large pieces.
Such folk work comes from the Orient, Morocco, Afghanistan, and, of course, the Baltic countries. Used mostly in necklaces, many of the beads are large, hand-shaped spheres or ovals.
Turquoise has a long history in jewelry. The Egyptians of the earliest dynasties focused great attention on this sky-blue stone, often grinding lit into a powder form to provide a unique blue eye shadowing.
It was a highly prized gem of the Mexican cultures, and the Persians and Tibetans used turquoise extensively. Some Germanic people used it as a betrothal stone. Among the American Indians, it was the principal stone. In almost all instances, the workings were those of cabochon cutters, carvers and sculptors who specialized in representational art.
A relatively soft stone, turquoise was easily worked and could quickly be buffed to a nice polished finish with a mixture of sand and water. Sometimes it was worked in a nugget form and other times it was shaped. Used alone or in combination with shell, coral and other soft materials, turquoise has continued in great popularity even up to contemporary times. Coral, incidentally, is usually vivid in color and easy to shape so it naturally became famous in Tibet, China, India, northern Africa, and the American Indians.
Other stones that found early use among gemcutters were meerschaum, jet and lignite, soapstone, lapis lazuli, and malachite. Where volcanic action was evident, obsidian was also used. It is a medium soft stone, but gemcutters quickly found that quartz pieces and flint could be used to shape it. Obsidian was valued among the Stone Age artisans and then later by Aztecs, Mayans, and Indian tribes of the Western U. S.
Glass, Too, Has Long Lapidary History
As a matter of fact, in 5,000 B. C. the Zadim, (stone workers,) of Sumeria were even making and working with an early form of glass. Not so surprising is the fact that the initial use of glass was to serve as an imitation gemstone.
Later, the Egyptians were to be given false credit for the development of glass or faience, (fah-yahnse'). It is pretty much established now that the real discovery of this glazed terra cotta ceramic ware, with its colored decorations, took place farther East and was brought to Egypt by Sumerian merchants.
Even farther east in Cambay, (in Western India's Gujarat State,) bead making has progressed to a fine art. Factories there were producing a variety of beads made from siliceous stones that are even today marketed all over the world.
Artisans of the Bronze and Classical Age, especially those who carved Greek seal stones, used techniques that were enormously time consuming. It was their habit to cut small chunks from large local blocks. Obsidian served as the sawing agent, the chunks were shaped with Naxian emery, and then apparently given a final polish with other corundum powders made into a watery paste.
How to measure an ounce of grit without an ounce scale.
Tumbling instructions tell you how much grit or polish to use per pound of rock or per tumbler barrel, and this is almost always given in ounces. This is fine, but most people do not have an ounce scale around the house, so measuring out one or more ounces presents a small problem. The following is an easy way to arrive at ounces and is based on standard measuring spoons. Start out with a rounded spoonful and level it off with the blade of a straight kitchen knife.
Course Grit: 1 ounce = 4 level teaspoons
Medium Grit: 1 ounce = 4 level teaspoons
Fine Grit: 1 ounce = 4 level teaspoons
Polish powder: 1 ounce = 8 level teaspoons
