Lapis lazuli
Lapis lazuli is a hard blue semi-precious stone prized since antiquity for its intense, permanent color. Its name comes from the Latin words Lapis (= “stone”) and lazulum
(= “blue).
In antiquity, mines located in what is today northeast Afghanistan were the principal source of lapis lazuli, and it was widely traded as a valuable yet scarce commodity. Its use in jewelry and luxury objects goes back many millennia; beads made of lapis lazuli have been found in Neolithic burials. Objects made of, or decorated with, lapis lazuli have been discovered in noteworthy ancient archaeological sites, including the “Royal Necropolis” at Ur in Mesopotamia, and the tomb of King Tutankhamen in Egypt.
Beginning in the late medieval period, lapis lazuli began to be imported into Europe. Ground into a fine powder (not easy to do, since it is quite hard!), it became the pigment base for ultramarine blue, one of the most expensive colors used by Renaissance painters. Because of its value and rarity (at times lapis lazuli cost more than its weight in gold!), ultramarine blue was used to represent the sky of heaven in religious art, and was also used for the robe of the Virgin Mary in paintings of the Madonna and Christ Child. It was truly an act of devotion for a wealthy patron to commission a painter to use ultramarine blue in a painted altarpiece or fresco for a church, since its cost was so extravagant.
See MCAD Library's catalog record for this material.
Lapis lazuli
Lapis lazuli is a hard blue semi-precious stone prized since antiquity for its intense, permanent color. Its name comes from the Latin words Lapis (= “stone”) and lazulum
(= “blue).
In antiquity, mines located in what is today northeast Afghanistan were the principal source of lapis lazuli, and it was widely traded as a valuable yet scarce commodity. Its use in jewelry and luxury objects goes back many millennia; beads made of lapis lazuli have been found in Neolithic burials. Objects made of, or decorated with, lapis lazuli have been discovered in noteworthy ancient archaeological sites, including the “Royal Necropolis” at Ur in Mesopotamia, and the tomb of King Tutankhamen in Egypt.
Beginning in the late medieval period, lapis lazuli began to be imported into Europe. Ground into a fine powder (not easy to do, since it is quite hard!), it became the pigment base for ultramarine blue, one of the most expensive colors used by Renaissance painters. Because of its value and rarity (at times lapis lazuli cost more than its weight in gold!), ultramarine blue was used to represent the sky of heaven in religious art, and was also used for the robe of the Virgin Mary in paintings of the Madonna and Christ Child. It was truly an act of devotion for a wealthy patron to commission a painter to use ultramarine blue in a painted altarpiece or fresco for a church, since its cost was so extravagant.
See MCAD Library's catalog record for this material.