Yesterday, we began looking at the spare beauty of winter color: black soil and white snow and the full range of earth tones between, gray and putty and taupe and brown, the shades of sand and silt and a dormant world at rest.
Sometimes, all of those shades come together in the earth itself, layered like winter blankets around a gemstone heart.
It’s banded flint.
It goes by a variety of names: banded flint; striped flint; often sold under the “gemstone name” of Polish flint, a nod to its most common modern source, in Poland. It’s a perfect example of how something unassuming, seemingly entirely utilitarian, can also manifest in great beauty, if only one knows where to look for it.
Generally speaking, in the context of Native art, most people think of “flint” only in terms of points: arrowheads, spear points, blades. And that is its most common use; after all, flint’s crystal structure is especially well suited to knapping. It was also used for ignition purposes: first in rudimentary fire-starting processes; then, as the technology developed, in flintlocks and other long weapons. Outside of our cultures, it’s commonly used today in a variety of industrial applications, particularly industrial ceramics and building materials such as mortar and brick.
I find it somehow fitting that a substance that is used to make brick and mortar and simultaneously to make weaponry can also be turned into a beautiful work of art, of the heart. But before we get to that, let’s take a look at what it is. And to do that, we need to look at what it may be, and what it maybe is not. I wrote about flint, tangentially, last year, when we looked at chert, and it provides a useful framework for today’s discussion. As I said then:
[Chert is] a sedimentary rock, microcrystalline in structure. Because it’s sedimentary, it actually often winds up being composed of more than one mineralogical element, and it manifests in different forms: in the most obvious sedimentary fashion, with mineral deposits layered on top of one another; in solid nodules; and in what are described as “concretionary masses,” the sediments bonding together in a blocky mass rather than overlaying each other horizontally. Chert is subject to what is known as conchoidal fracture, the quality that produces incredibly sharp fracture edges, and precisely what makes it so perfect for fashioning projectile points.
Experts disagree on whether flint is actually merely another form of chert, or a separate type of stone in its own right. Either way, it manifests a bit differently, and I tend to regard it as a separate stone. Like chert, it can be made up of quartz or chalcedony crystals, but chert is also often composed of siltstone (sometimes called “mudstone,” and something we’ve covered a couple of times — one example is the reddish-brown stone that forms host rock and/or the so-called “chocolate matrix” of some Bisbee turquoise, and pipestone, which we covered here last week, is also a form of siltstone).
Chert comes in a variety of colors, the most common of which is probably white. Not snow-white, of course; more the shade of dirty slush, with a beige or gray cast to it. It’s an opaque stone, and often carries inclusions of other materials, sometimes to an extent that, as with turquoise, the minerals present alter the color of the stone itself. And so you find arrowheads and blades made of chert that range in hue from cool silvery grays to warm dark charcoal shades, from ivory to beige to tan to earthy browns, and from pale pinkish tones to nearly brick red.
It is true that, as I said then, I regard flint as a stone that is separate from chert, one that possesses its own identity, but they are unquestionably related, part of the same rock family. Flint is also a hard sedimentary rock, a cryptocrystalline form of quartz. Like chert, flint often appears in the form of nodules, but also occurs as mass inclusions in larger sedimentary rock formations. One example is limestone; another is chalk. Flint masses or nodules are often rough-textured and whitish in color on the outside, but the inside may vary in color and feel, manifesting in shades of black, white, gray, brown, or even green, and with a slightly slick or glassy texture.
How flint actually forms is the subject of debate. What is known, obviously, is that it results from sedimentary processes over time on a geologic scale. One such process is called diagenesis, and it refers to the various chemical changes that sedimentary substances undergo as they form and change, after the point at which the deposit first occurs and is lithified (i.e., turned into rock). Diagenetic processes do not include metamorphosis or weathering; rather, they refer specifically to other physical, chemical, and even biological changes. With regard specifically to the formation of flint, some speculate that the diagenetic process includes the introduction of gelatinous material into voids created by the boring activities of various living creatures, since departed; the gelatinous substance is thought to silicify over time, eventually hardening into the unusual nodule shapes in which flint is found. It’s not unusual to find bits of fossilized coral and other animal life trapped in pieces of flint.
Significant flint deposits are found in many parts of the world. Some of the largest occur in the U.S. and in Europe, but they exist in parts of Asia and South America, as well. However, when it comes to the beautiful striated form of the stone known as banded flint, its occurrence is much more rare.
I noted above that this type of flint goes by various names. Perhaps the most common now is “striped flint,” and its derivation is obvious. However, we have always heard it called “banded flint,” and it seems to me a more accurate rendering of the rock’s identity: “Striping” seems to imply a surface effect, but “banding” is a sedimentary process of accretion, aggregation, a layering that goes all the way through the stone. Thus, we continue to refer to it by its older appellation, banded flint.
In the gemstone market, however, it is more often sold under what is essentially a trade name: Polish flint. The label is understandable; the largest known source of banded flint is in the historical region of Poland known as “Lesser Poland.” The famed city of Kraków is its capital, but the deposits of banded flint that bear the region’s name occur near several other cities in the area: Iłża, Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski, and Sandomierz. It is now one of the region’s established exports, popularly used in jewelry, but experts have traced its use in the area back at least to 4,000 B.C.E., finding substantial evidence of its mining and use in ax manufacture near an ancient village called Krzemionki Opatowskie.
Some sources report, erroneously, that Poland is the only source of banded flint. However, the historical record indicates that deposits have occurred in the flint-heavy geologic strata of what is now known as Ohio. Given its presumed method of formation, and the prevalence of flint deposits generally worldwide, I think it would be irresponsible to assume that banded flint does not occur elsewhere, even if it has not been “discovered” yet. After all, most seekers of precious gems are looking for what the market deems valuable, rather than for the banded beauty of the earth’s own heart; it’s not as though it’s an obvious target for those seeking fame, fortune, and treasure.
Wings has two or three of these heart-shaped banded flint cabochons, all in similar shades, but with variations in banding. I was able to track down only one of them yesterday in preparation for today’s post, but all are in similar shades of sandy taupe and ivory and dove gray. They were purchased under the “Polish flint” label, sourced to the mines in Poland. I sometimes deliberately “misread” the label as “polish,” rather than “Polish,” since it fits, as well: a seemingly utilitarian substance, dull and putty-like, given a whole new existence simply by polishing the rock to a silken sheen.
“Crystal” practitioners, predictably, impute specific powers to banded flint (under the label of “striped flint”). They regard it as a talismanic rock, one that protects against nightmares and sleep disturbance, that “rejuvenates” the user, that turns shyness into social gregariousness.
In our way, it’s simply a beautiful ornamental stone, one whose identity is informed and enhanced by its practical uses and unassuming appearance. Seen in that light, this particular cabochon shape is especially fitting: In its way, it is the heart of the earth.
~ Aji
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