Sarah Caldwell-Steele: Jet Black

There’s dark…and then there’s jet-black.

Jet, often referred to as ‘The Witch’s Stone’ remains one of the least understood gemmological materials on earth. With its roots in prehistory, jet has unusual and anomalous properties, and that these attributes, often described in Anglo-Saxon texts as eight powers, have resulted in its association with magic, witchcraft, and the occult for millennia. It’s present-day association with death and the macabre however, is a Victorian concept, a remnant of the deep wave of mourning which swept through the British Empire following the death of George IV in 1830. Modern pagan practices often seem at odds with the evidence presented in the archaeological record and the literature of classical antiquity. Have we lost touch with these old beliefs, or are they indeed hiding below the surface of our modern practices?

Sarah Caldwell-Steele is 'The Queen of Jet', she is a geologist and gemologist who has been leading the trade in consideration of various issues regarding the identification and classification of jet, owner of The Ebor Jetworks , Whitby, and PhD researcher in archeology at Durham University.