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Amber is not a mineral, as it began as a amorphous resin. In fact, it is actually a "glob" of fossilized tree resin or sap that flowed down an ancient coniferous tree trunk in an ancient forest--perhaps in a forest that is now lost in antiquity. The tree sap was sticky, and it caught organic materials: drops of water, bits of moss, dirt, bark, seeds and insects. As it grew older, it hardened into a sort of Mother-Nature-made plastic, a resin, and mellowed into a golden, light brown-orange color known as Amber. The more clear the resin, the more perfect the color, the more full of organic materials the amber is, the more it is worth. Amber is considered a gemstone--an organic gemstone like a pearl, which is generated from biological processes. Amber is generally found in association with lignite coal, which is also the fossilized remains of trees and other plant material.
Amber perfectly preserves insects from decomposition--even their soft tissues are preserved. As seen in the movie Jurassic Park, mosquitoes can still have the blood of their victims inside them, sealed and kept intact forever. It's no wonder Amber is a symbol of eternity--and eternal divinity.
Amber is most often set in gold and silver jewelry. The Mediterranean countries started to trade in Amber for jewelry making as far back as 2500 BC. Amber from this period has been found 600 miles from its place of origin. Amber was very popular and highly valued in this time period, because it is softer than minerals and was easier to work with primitive methods.
The word "electricity" is derived from the Greek name for Amber, electrum. This is because Amber can acquire an electric charge when rubbed. Thales described this magical property in about 600 BC - and it remains one of the most useful methods of identifying real amber in gold and silver jewelry. There have always been claims that amber rosaries and amulets can actually conduct current, discharging excess energy in the body. Amber has long been worn and carried by men, as a talisman against sexual impotence.
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Amber represents the division between an individual's energy and cosmic energy, the individual's soul and the universal soul of all living things. It is the symbol of divinity. Ancient painters used the color amber to denote the divine. The faces of gods and goddesses, heroes and saints were all painted amber. The word "electricity" is derived from the Greek name for Amber, electrum. This is because Amber can acquire an electric charge when rubbed. Thales described this magical property in about 600 BC - and it remains one of the most useful methods of identifying real amber in gold and silver jewelry. There have always been claims that amber rosaries and amulets can actually conduct current, discharging excess energy in the body.
When the Greek god Apollo was banished from Olympus, he wept tears of Amber.
In another Greek myth, the god Phaethon lost control of his father Zeus's Sun chariot, driving it too close to the Earth. It caught fire. This is the ancient version of the young son crashing the car, and Zeus was furious. Unfortunately, he didn't curb his temper, and when you can throw around thunder bolts, a temper is a bad thing to have. Zeus struck Phaethon dead with one such lightning bolt. Phaethon's body fell out of the heavens and into the Eridanus River. The nymphs of the stream collected the body and buried it on the shores of the river. Awhile later, Phaethon's three sisters, the Heliades, found the grave and mourned him day and night. They were so overcome with sadness that their bodies started to rot, and took root in the muddy shore. They were slowly transformed into trees and their tears hardened into drops of Amber.
Santi di Tito painted this scene magnificently in 1572 with oil on slate. Look closely and you'll see their tears are falling as Amber Nuggets. The cherubim and those beside them are picking up the amber on the ground.
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Amber...
can be Cognac...
or Green...
or Yellow
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For thousands of years, the largest source of amber has been the Baltic coast, which extends from Gdansk to the coastlines of Denmark and Sweden. It is mined there, and can even be found on the shores after heavy storms. Amber is only slightly denser than saltwater, and can be carried vast distances by the sea. Baltic Amber has even been found on the eastern shores of England. |
The most fantastically beautiful use of Amber in history was the creation of "The Amber Room" in Catherine the Great's Russian Palace. Imagine if you can an entire room decorated with panels of cut amber, gold, Venetian mirrors, Florentine mosiacs worked in Amber, wood and mother-of-pearl inlay floors--all of it lit by candlelight. It was described as the "Eighth Wonder of the World."
Please click here to see a picture of The Amber Room before World War II.
Unfortunately, the original Amber Room was pillaged by Nazis in 1941, and the crates and boxes that held its pieces mysteriously disappeared and were probably destroyed in a fire at the end of the war. But there is good news: The Amber Room reconstruction was commissioned in 1979, began in 1982, and was completed in 2003.
The room was actually created in Prussia for King Frederick I originally for the royal palace at Charlottenburg. But by the time the Amber panels were finished in 1711, the plan changed, and The Amber Room was installed in the smoking room in the royal palace in Berlin. Then in 1716, King Frederick's son, Frederick William I, forged an alliance with Russian Czar Peter I against the Swedish King, Charles XIII. To celebrate the agreement, Frederick William gave Peter The Amber Room. It was packed into 18 crates and carried by horse and wagon to St. Petersburg in April 1717. Then in 1755, Empress Elisabeth I had the Amber panels moved to the beautiful Catherine Palace at Tsarskoye Selo. More Amber was cut to fill the larger room there, and in 1763 The Amber Room was complete. |
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