Apatite
Also Blue apatite, Asparagus stone
Transparent to translucent, most often a strong sea-blue or blue-green, also yellow, violet and colourless. Bright, glassy, and usually small.
- Crystal system
- Hexagonal
- Hardness
- 5 Mohs
- Handling
- Soft for a gemstone at 5 on Mohs, and brittle with it. Quartz, steel and most other stones will scratch it, so store it apart from them in a soft pouch. Heat and strong sunlight can pale the blue. Never in an ultrasonic cleaner, no long soaking, and no elixirs.
- In water
- No
What it is held to be for
Apatite was named from the Greek for deceit, because it was forever being mistaken for other stones: beryl, tourmaline, peridot. The tradition turned the joke round and made it a stone of accurate seeing, a reminder that appetite and appearance both mislead, and that the honest question is what a thing actually is.
Named by A. G. Werner, 1786, from Greek apatao, to deceive
Correspondences
These are the tradition's ascriptions, not properties of the mineral.
- Planet
- Mercury
- Element
- Air
- Signs
- Gemini, Aquarius
- Chinese phase
- Water
- Year animal
- Monkey, Rat
- Centre
- Throat Vishuddha
- Sephirah
- Hod
How it is used
Carried while studying or making, and set down on the table where the work is. Too soft for daily rings; a pendant, or a pocket stone in a soft pouch, keeps it unscratched.
Today
Hold the apatite and name one thing you have been pretending about. Say the true version aloud. Then get back to work.
A longer working
On a Wednesday, take the apatite and a list of everything you are supposed to be doing. Read the list aloud with the stone in your hand. Cross off, honestly, whatever you are not going to do this month, not later but never. Keep the stone on the shortened list overnight. In the morning that list is the plan. Do the first line of it before you check anything else.
Works with
- Herb
- Fennel
- Incense
- Mastic