381g Jaspopal skull – Feathertop

Mother Rigby, as Nathaniel Hawthorne tells in 1852, was one of the most cunning and powerful witches in New England. For her cornfield she built herself a scarecrow. Its backbone was an old broom handle, its head a somewhat withered, shriveled pumpkin, in which she cut two holes as eyes and a slit as a mouth. Then she stuck the scarecrow’s pipe in its mouth: “Puff away, my fine fellow, your life depends on it!” And the scarecrow puffed and lived. She dressed him in splendid finery and named him Feathertop, because a feather stuck in his hat. Then she sent him off to woo the pretty daughter of the honorable Master Gookin. But a mirror showed Feathertop what he really was: a shabby patchwork, laid bare of all witchcraft. He fled back to Mother Rigby, hurled the pipe with all his might at the hearth, and collapsed, a jumble of straw and tattered clothes. Thousands upon thousands of fools and quacks exist in the world, the witch mused, and none of them ever sees himself as he truly is. This skull bears the colors in which such a scarecrow would stand in autumn on its field. Its entire surface resembles the leaf canopy of a deep forest that has fallen and now covers the ground. Rust-brown, ochre and chestnut lie over a light, pink-beige ground, interwoven with fine hairlike lines like the veins of withered leaves. It is smoothly polished and yet not glassy. The fingers slide over it with gentle resistance, as if brushing over leaves that are not quite dry yet. Nor is its stone what it seems. It resembles jasper and is an opal: a common opal stained by iron oxides into rust-brown and ochre. Even the mineralogist James Dwight Dana described in 1868 such a jasper-opal as an opal with the color of jasper and the luster of common opal. And contrary to its appearance, it contains water, three to over ten percent of its weight. What Feathertop destroyed in the mirror makes this stone all the more intriguing: only those who look closely can discern what it is really made of. Material: common opal, jasperized by iron oxides (jasperopal): pink-beige base with rust-brown, ochre and chestnut speckling; Origin: Australia Dimensions: 9.0 x 6.0 x 6.3 cm Weight: 381 g Special features: autumn-leaf-like speckling in brown, ochre and rust tones; fine net of natural hairlines over the entire skull; silky-smooth yet grippy surface; matte-polished eye sockets and gaps between teeth; occasional greenish-gray specks; Care: protect from heat, strong sun and rapid temperature changes, as opal contains water

Estimate:£0.83

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