Lapis Lazuli associated with the Throat Chakra is a vibrant, deep blue coloured rock whose significant component is Lazurite. A feldspathoid silicate mineral.

It can also contain pyrite, sodalite and calcite, and mica, hornblende, augite and diopside, among other constituents. The stone occurs as a result of contact metamorphism in crystalline marble.

All crystals belong to a different group according to the basis of the relationships of their axes. There are seven systems and 32 classes of symmetry. Lapis Lazuli does not belong to a particular crystal system as it is a rock. Its main component, Lazurite, occurs as a dodecahedron.

Lapis Lazuli mined as far back as the 7th Millenium BC in the Sari-Sang mines in the Badakhshan region of northeast Afghanistan.

It has been found in beads in Neolithic burials. It appeared in the form of eyebrows on the funeral mask of King Tutankhamun.

On export to Europe in the middle ages, the stone was ground and used as a deep blue pigment. Employed by the essential artists of the Renaissance and Baroque such as Perugino and Vermeer. Lapis was used on these figures’ clothing, a prime example of the Virgin Mary’s cloak.

Significant sources of Lapiz Lazuli are found in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chile and Russia.