Sky blue stone : the turquoise trade in world history / Arash Khazeni.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Khazeni, Arash, author.

Series:

California world history library ; 20.

The California world history library ; 20

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Turquoise--History.

Turquoise.

Mineral industries--History.

Mineral industries.

History.

Mines and mineral resources--History.

Mines and mineral resources.

Physical Description:

xvii, 195 pages ; 23 cm.

Other Title:

Turquoise trade in world history

Place of Publication:

Berkeley : University of California Press, [2014]

Summary:

This book traces the journeys of a stone across the world. From its remote point of origin in the city of Nishapur in eastern Iran, turquoise was traded through India, Central Asia, and Ottoman empites. Along this trail unfolds the story of turquoise--phosphate of aluminum and copper formed in rocks below the surface of the earth-and its discovery and export as a global commodity. In the material culture and imperial regalia of early modern Islamic tributary empires moving from the steppe to the sown, turquoise was a scared stone and a potent symbol of power projected in vivid color displays. From the empires of Islamic Eurasia, the turquoise trade reached Europe, where the stone was collected as an exotic object from the East. The Eurasian trade lasted into the nineteenth century, when the oldest mines in Iran collapsed and lost Aztec mines in the Americas reopened, unearthing more accessible sources of the stone to rival the Persian blue. Sky Blue Stone recounts the origins, trade, and circulation of a natural object in the context of the history of Islamic Eurasia and global encounters between empire and nature. Book jacket.

Contents:

List of illustrations

Preface

Introduction : The turquoise ring of the Emperor Jahangir

1. The colored earth

2. Turquoise, trade, and empire in early modern Eurasia

3. The turquoise of Islam

4. Stone from the East

5. The other side of the world

Epilogue : Indian stone.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780520279070

0520279077

9780520282551

0520282558

OCLC:

862041485