The ear-bones of fish, almost invariably in pairs, are still used as amulets in Spain and Italy. One of their chief virtues is to protect children from the Evil Eye, as well as from accidents of any kind. They are also believed to preserve the wearer from deafness or diseases of the ear.^[378] This is quite in accord with the primitive fancy that the different parts of the animal body had prophylactic or curative powers in relation to any disease of that portion of the human body.

Even the spider was supposed to produce a stone having remedial power, especially that variety called by the Germans Kreuzspinne (“cross-spider”). The belief was general in Germany, in the sixteenth century, that it was very unlucky to injure one of these spiders; indeed, Encelius writes that although he had never seen a “spider-stone,” he had never dared to dissect one of the spiders to seek for the stone. He also remarks that it was in no wise strange this should have such power, since spider-webs were used as remedies for many diseases. Naturally enough the “spider-stone” was an antidote against poisons, and a belief was current that in a year when the plague was raging no Kreuzspinne was to be seen.^[379]

An attempt to induce one of these spiders to secrete or produce its stone or calculus is told by Simon Paulli. On his return from France in 1630, he stopped for the summer with his revered master, Sennart, at Wittenberg, in order to pursue his studies. One day they found by chance that an enormous spider had wandered into the rain-water holder, and the extraordinary size of the creature—it was as big as a muscat nut—suggested the idea of making it the subject of experiment. It was therefore put into a glass jar with a quantity of powdered valerian root, this material (or salt) being reputed to have a favorable influence in the production of the stone. However, the experimenters were doomed to disappointment, for the poor spider was unable to live up to its reputation. Tired of waiting for nothing, recourse was finally had to the drastic measure of dissection, but no stone of any kind could be found. This convinced the observers that all the talk about spiders’ stones was mere foolishness or deception. In a note in the Miscellanea Curiosa, under date of 1686, the statement is made that such stones could indeed be found, but only in the autumn season and in no other part of the year.^[380]

A small golden amulet, having the form of a heart and set with various stones, was strongly recommended to ward off the plague by Oswald Croll, a writer of the early part of the seventeenth century. On the upper side of the heart-amulet should be set a fair blue sapphire; above, beneath, and at either side of this should be put a toad-stone, or a “spider-stone,” so as to give a cross effect. The “spider-stones” were asserted to be powerful enemies of the plague. On the under side of the heart a good-sized jacinth was to be set, the jacinth also being credited with great virtue against plague or pestilence. The gold heart was to be hollow within. To give a finishing touch to the efficacy of the amulet it was necessary to take a living toad and keep the creature suspended by its hind-legs until it died and dried up so that the body could be reduced to a powder. This powder was then to be kneaded into a sort of paste with a little very sharp vinegar and introduced into the hollow interior of the gold heart.^[381]

The “fretful porcupine” also contributed its stone to the series of concretions; this was usually found in the animal’s head, and was considered to be even superior to the bezoar as an antidote against poison. If steeped in water for a quarter of an hour, the water became so bitter that “there was nothing in the world more bitter.” Another stone supposed to be found in the animal’s entrails possessed like properties, but was said to lose none of its weight when placed in water, while the first-mentioned stone became lighter. Tavernier bought three of these stones, paying as much as five hundred crowns for one of them.^[382]

A jewel made of ambergris, in the J. Pierpont Morgan collection, is said to be the only specimen of its kind that has been preserved for us from medieval times. The perfumed material has been skilfully carved into the symbolic figures of a woman and three children. At one time believed to symbolize Charity, the later theory is that these figures have a less pure significance and rather denote the reproductive energies, for ornaments of this material were credited with aphrodisiac powers; however, they were also believed to cure stomachic disorders. The delicate perfume they exhaled was one of their chief titles to admiration, and after the lapse of more than three centuries, this particular jewel still emits a fragrant aromatic odor when it has been held for some time in a warm hand. The style of the workmanship indicates that this is a piece of cinquecento Italian work. It was at one time in the Wencke Collection, in Hamburg, and later formed part of the Spitzer Collection, until the sale of the latter in 1893.^[383]

While many of the reports of the finding of immense masses of ambergris (in one the weight of the mass is given as three thousand pounds) may be classed as at least highly improbable, still there is abundant unmistakable evidence that very large pieces have really occasionally been found. In Rome and in the Santa Casa of Loreto costly and artistically shaped pieces of ambergris were to be seen, which clearly indicated that the weight of the original unworked mass must have greatly exceeded that of the ornamental object. There can be no doubt of the authenticity of the details regarding a great piece of ambergris weighing 182 pounds bought in the year 1693 from King Fidori by the Dutch East India Company for 11,000 rigsdalers or nearly $12,000 at the current valuation of the coin of that time. In form it resembled a tortoise-shell, was 5 feet 8 inches thick, and 2 feet 2 inches long. After being long kept in Amsterdam as a curiosity, and having been viewed there by thousands of persons, it was finally broken up and sold at auction.^[384] A lump extracted from a whale in the Windward Islands weighed 130 pounds and was sold for $3500, or nearly $27 a pound.

The livers of certain animals provided concretions called haraczi by the Arabs; these were much used as remedies for epilepsy. The Turkish butchers, when slaughtering animals, always examined the livers carefully so as to secure these stones. As the Jews were said to suffer much from melancholia and epileptic disorders they valued the liver-stones very highly.^[385]

The use of fossils as talismans and for the cure of diseases was mainly due to their strange and various forms. As color played the most important part in the case of precious stones, each color being looked upon as possessing a certain symbolic significance fitting the stone for some special use or uses, so in the case of fossils the form was the determining factor. Sometimes it was as the form of some creature held by the superstitious to be particularly endowed with mysterious qualities beneficial to mankind, at other times the fossil form suggested some part of the human body, and was therefore believed to afford protection to this part, or to cure any disease affecting it. This will be made clearer by a brief notice of some of the principal fossils which were favored in ancient and medieval times, either by popular superstition or by those who from interested motives made use of these superstitions for the purpose of gain, although they may have only half believed in the real virtue of the objects they sold.

The remedial quality of fossils, which were believed to have been formed from shells and marine animals deposited during the deluge, is ascribed by Mentzel to the fact that they had been produced by the action of fire, and hence had the same quality as though prepared and calcined by the chemist’s art. They were therefore believed to have great medicinal virtues in the cure of diseases.^[386]

The lapis Judaicus^[387] is described as of oval form, in shape like an olive, and sometimes provided with a stem at the upper part as though it had grown on a tree. The stone was soft and friable and in color either white or grayish. The “male” variety had several rows of equidistant spines, while the “female” was quite smooth. The description and the figured representations of the lapis Judaicus show that it was a form of pentremite—that is, a form of crinoid. This fossil, which was said to come from Syria and Palestine, was taken in solution as a remedy for calculus. The larger, male stones, were regarded as the better for renal calculus and the smaller, female stones, for vesical calculus. Hence this fossil was sometimes called tecolithos, from τήκειν, to dissolve, and λίθος, stone.^[388] Pliny also states that this name was applied to certain concretions found in sponges and supposed to possess similar virtues.^[389] Of the remedial use of this stone, or fossil, Galen states that when prescribed for vesical calculi, it was pulverized in a mortar, and the powder being mixed with water, three glasses of the solution were given. He adds, however: “I must say that as far as I have seen they have no effect, but they are efficient in the case of renal calculi.”^[390]

No fossils were more prized than the so-called glossopetræ or “tongue-stones.” Although these were really the fossilized or petrified teeth of a species of shark, Pliny and his sources believed them to be meteorites, which “fell from the sky when the moon was waning.” This was, indeed, a prevalent fancy regarding all dart-shaped, pointed or sharpened fossils, or flints. Because of this celestial origin, the glossopetræ were said to control the winds and even to affect the motions of the moon. At a later time the chief source of supply for these petrified teeth was the island of Malta, and they were therefore sometimes called lingues Melitenses, or Maltese tongues; the Germans named them Steinzungen, or “stone-tongues.” According to popular belief these so-called Maltese tongues were petrified snakes’ tongues and they were brought into connection with the miraculous adventure of St. Paul on the island of Malta, when he shook off a viper that had fastened on his hand, and sustained no injury from the bite (Acts, xxviii, 3–5). This was taken to signify that the poison had been taken from all the snakes on the island.^[391]

The material called “St. Paul’s Earth,” said to be derived from “St. Paul’s Cave,” in the island of Malta, was reduced to a fine powder and made into tablets. These were stamped with the Maltese cross; sometimes on the opposite side some other figure was impressed. As there was temptation to sell other material for the genuine, the purchaser was warned to be on his guard. The virtues of this powder—which was dissolved in wine or water—were numerous, and were the same as those ascribed to the “tongues” (glossopetræ) and to the “eyes”; for it was believed to be an antidote for poisons, cured the bites of venomous creatures, and remedied many other ills. The “eyes” were set in rings so that the material touched the wearer’s skin; the “tongues” were worn attached to the arm or suspended from the neck. Sometimes vessels were made from the earth. These were filled with wine or water, the liquid being allowed to stand until it had absorbed the virtues of the earth; it was then taken as a potion with good effects. The “tongues” and “eyes” were often dipped in wine or water and were supposed to transmit their curative powers to the liquid.^[392]

In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries a strange belief was prevalent among the ignorant to the effect that the fossil sharks’-teeth, the “tongue-stones,” were the teeth of witches who sucked the blood of infants; these “vampires” were called lamiæ in ancient times.^[393] Probably the fact that a certain species of shark bore the name lamiæ gave rise to this idea, which was therefore merely due to a confusion of names. Nevertheless we can easily understand that this popular belief added to the repute of the glossopetræ, for the more dreaded the object the greater the power it was credited with possessing. In the seventeenth century De Laet (d. 1649), the Dutch naturalist and geographer, received in Leyden certain glossopetræ sent him by a friend in Bordeaux, who wrote that they would cure any one suffering from soreness of the mouth, whether this were the result of having eaten impure food, or were produced by some derangement of the secretions. The “tongues” were to be dipped in spring water and would cause bubbles to form therein; as soon as these disappeared, the water was to be used as a gargle, and the mouth was to be washed with it two or three times. De Laet’s friend assured him that this treatment would cure the disorder in twenty-four hours.^[394]

A seventeenth century amulet of a fossil shark’s tooth, mounted in silver and found in an excavation at Salzburg, Austria, was among the objects exhibited by the writer for the New York branch of the American Folk-Lore Society, in the Department of Ethnology of the Columbian Exposition held in Chicago, in 1893. They are frequently found at Lake Constance but are from the ancient fossiliferous formations and not from the lake. They are often sold as amulets.

Fossils whose form suggested that of a more or less acutely pointed shaft, were thought to possess special powers, sometimes offensive as against enemies, and again defensive for the protection of the wearer. Thus the belemnites,^[395] considered to represent the form of a dart, when dissolved and taken as a potion, were said to prevent nightmare and to guard against enchantments. They are often either ash-colored or whitish, and sometimes reddish-black. All these varieties were frequently found during the sixteenth century in Hildesheim, and in the marble grotto near the castle of Marienburg, called the “Dwarf’s Grotto.”^[396]

The umbilicus marinus, a fossil shell, which in form bore a great likeness to the human navel, was called “sea-bean” by sailors. Usually of a pale saffron hue, some specimens have a reddish or blackish tinge. In the sixteenth century it was believed to have astringent properties. We are also told that women used it as one of the ingredients of a cosmetic for whitening the complexion.^[397]

Certain echinites (fossil sea-urchins) found on the Baltic coast are called by the peasants Adlersteine and Krallensteine (“eagle-stones” and “claw-stones”), since they believe that while the substance was soft eagles had seized them with their talons, thus producing the peculiar forms and markings. Whoever had a fossil of this description on his table while a thunder-storm was raging ran no risk of being struck by lightning.^[398]

Reich describes another variety of echinite, which was popularly known as a “toad-stone,” the specimen he figures having been given him by a certain Johannis Krauss. In this appeared some large cavities, whose presence Reich found it very difficult to explain, until Krauss informed him that they had been made by a former owner of the fossil who had scraped out a few grains of the substance each year for medicinal use. He was persuaded that his long life—he attained the age of eighty—was entirely owing to his employment of this remedy.^[399]

The trochites and entrochus, named Räderstein, or “wheel-stone,” by the Germans, are other fossils to which remedial or talismanic virtue was accorded in popular fancy. These “wheel-stones,” while detachable, fitted as closely together in the original formation as though they had been skilfully adjusted by a clever artisan.^[400] De Laet states that when immersed in oil they gave forth bubbles and moved about spontaneously. Still another of these fossils believed to be amulets was the enastros, which De Boot terms the asteria vera, or genuine asteria, since it not merely showed a star-shaped marking as did the fossil coral bearing the name astroites, but was shaped like a five-pointed star. As with the trochites, chains of these little stars were found, closely joined together but separable from one another. Some called them “star-seals,” because the stellar imprint was sharp and clearly defined as though the work of an engraver or gem-cutter.^[401] These fossils are types of encrinites.

The sections of the stem-like fossils called entrochus by the older writers have been named St. Cuthbert’s beads in later times, while the fossil called lapis Judaicus has borne the name of “stone-lily,” because in form it resembles the lily. Ages ago the stem and flower-like head united constituted a crinoid (a marine zoophyte). These aquatic creatures—half-plant and half-animal—usually twine their roots about some shell in the depths of the waters, but sometimes they become detached and then, moving their delicate tentacles, they creep along the bottom of the sea.

In olden times parts, or segments, of an animal were worn as a protection against harm from that particular creature, or else to endow the wearer with some of its real or fancied qualities. In modern times this tendency finds expression in the wearing of jewels of animal form, wherein precious stones are grouped and arranged so as to constitute different parts of the creature’s body. Such jewels are often looked upon as “mascots.”

A peculiar fossil was known to the Germans by the name of Mutterstein, and is called hysterolithus in the Latin treatises of Agricola, De Boot, etc., a word of Greek derivation signifying the resemblance of the object to an organ of the body. These fossils are formed from the contents of certain shells, and retain the shape of the enclosing shell, which has broken away. Some of these formations were called enorchi from a fancied resemblance to another organ and were regarded as phallic emblems, while others were thought to figure the heart, especially large specimens being named bucardites, or “ox-hearts.” This name is already employed by Pliny. The hysterolithus was used to cure various female diseases, and to the bucardites was accorded among other virtues that of increasing the wearer’s courage.^[402] The hysterolithus is believed to be the same as the autoglyphus mentioned by pseudo-Plutarch as having been found in the river Sagaris, in Asia Minor. Its peculiar shape was regarded as symbolizing Cybele, the mother of the gods, and the story ran that if one of the unfortunate male victims of Eastern jealousy should obtain a stone of this kind he would become reconciled to his sad lot and would cease to regret his lost manhood.

If we were inclined to accord the title of precious stones to stones greatly esteemed for their talismanic virtues, a high place in this category would be assigned to the sâlagrâma-stone of the Hindus.^[403] Among the aboriginal inhabitants of India this was regarded as a symbol of the female principle in nature, and of its representative the goddess Prakrti, and in the later Hindu belief the stone was looked upon as the special emblem of the god Vishnu, the “Preserver,” the second personage of the Hindu Trimurti. It is therefore ardently revered by those who are more especially devoted to the worship of Vishnu. These stones are fossil formations, either of ammonites or univalve mollusks of a spiral order, and consist of a number of spirals surrounding a circular, central perforation. They are generally the hardened filling of the shell itself, which has entirely weathered away. For the stone to be an effectual talisman, the diameter of the perforation should not exceed one-eighth of the total diameter of the sâlagrâma. The best specimens are said to be found in Nepal, on the upper course of the Gandakî, which flows into the Ganges from the north, and is called the Salagrama River, because the sacred stone is found in it.

There can be little doubt that we have here a substance similar to the fossils described by Pliny and his successors under the names brontia, ombria, ovum anguinum, and cornu ammonis, and it is most probable that in India, as in Europe, these fossils were believed to have fallen from heaven, and were associated with the thunderbolt. Hence they would be regarded by the Hindus as more especially sacred to Vishnu, who was originally a divinity representing the various forms of light, one of his manifestations being the lightning.

The sâlagrâmas must be carefully chosen, for not all of them are luck-bringing, some being bearers of ill-fortune. A black sâlagrâma brings fame to the owner, and a red one, a crown; but one with an unduly large perforation would cause dissension and strife in a family, one with irregularly formed spirals portends misfortune, and a brown one would bring to pass the death of its owner’s wife. Each faithful worshipper of Vishnu has one of these stones, but two may not be in the same house. To give away a sâlagrâma would be equivalent to casting away every prospect of good fortune. However, only one who belongs to the three highest castes is entitled to become an owner of the sacred stone, in which the very spirit of Vishnu is supposed to dwell; neither a Sudra nor a Pariah enjoys this privilege, which is also denied to women.

The sâlagrâma is carefully wrapped in linen cloths, and must be often washed and perfumed. The water with which it has been washed becomes a consecrated drink. The master of the house must adore the stone once each day, either in the morning or in the evening. As the sâlagrâma not only brings happiness in this world but also insures felicity in the future world, it is held over the dying Hindu while water is allowed to trickle through the orifice. This ceremony appears to have a certain analogy to the rite of extreme unction administered in the Catholic Church.

It is stated by Finn Magnusen that in Iceland, toward the beginning of the last century, he saw superstitious peasants carefully guard small stones of peculiar appearance in pretty bags filled with fine flour. They treated these stones with great reverence and either wore them on their persons or placed them in their beds or other furniture.^[404]

The fossils known as brontiæ, ombriæ and chelonites were all believed to be antidotes for poison and also to make the wearer victorious over his enemies. Hence they were sometimes set in the pommels of swords. That these objects were equally potent in peace, is shown by the fact that Danish peasant women placed them in their milk pails to ward off the effects of any spell that might have been cast over the cow’s milk by a malevolent witch.^[405]

David Reich notes the four kinds of astroites, or “victory stones,” given by De Boot; the first, marked with small stars; the second, with rose-like figures; the third, with wavy lines, like the convolutions of a worm; the fourth, with obscure and indefinite markings. To these varieties Reich adds a fifth, the convex side of which was marked with black crosses, while the other, flat side, showed larger crosses surrounded by circles; all these markings were so perfect that an artist could scarcely imitate them; this specimen he had set, with other precious gems, in a silver cross, the flat side of the fossil, at the back of the cross, being covered by a heart-shaped topaz.^[406] These were all specimens of fossil coral.

The saga of Dietrich of Bern relates of King Nidung that on the eve of a battle in which his forces were much inferior to those of the enemy, he was filled with despair to find that he had left his “victory stone” in his castle, miles away from where he had pitched his tent. Overmastered by his desire to regain possession of his stone at this critical time, Nidung offered a large sum of money and his daughter’s hand to anyone who would bring it to him before the battle began. The distance was so great and the time so short that the task seemed utterly impossible, and a young esquire, Velint by name, was the only one willing to risk the enterprise. He was favored in his quest by having a horse of wonderful strength and endurance, by whose help he barely succeeded in making the long journey to the castle and returning in time. King Nidung, wearing his invincible stone, was the victor in the battle, and he did not fail to carry out his rather rash promise.^[407]

Amulets of fossil coral are freely used in Italy, especially in the province of Aquila, and are called “witch-stones” (pietre stregonie). These are similar to one type of the “asterias” worn as amulets in ancient and medieval times. Many of the Italian amulets are incised or engraved with Christian subjects, one figured by Bellucci bearing the head of Christ on the obverse, and Christ on the cross on the reverse side; on others appears the image of the Virgin Mary.^[408]

Crystalline quartz will sometimes show a star either at base or apex, if cut en cabochon. This is due to the presence of acicular crystals of rutile or to air spaces. Those specimens from Albany, Maine and other places present this phenomenon, and Starolite and Astrolite or “star stone” has been suggested as an appropriate name for this variety.