Jet black describes a rich dark black, or the blackest black of all, as in jet-black hair. An ancient painter's pigment, jet is also treasured in jewelry as a gemstone and protective talisman. Its popularity escalates with the mourning protocol of the Victorian era.
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Jet is ascribed protective or facilitating properties since the late Pleistocene or Ice Age.
A mineraloid, jet is a type of low quality coal or lignite. It can appear in tones from dark brown to opaque black.
Jet can be hard, about 4 on the Mohs scale, or soft, around 2.5, similar to gold. Glass has a hardness of 5 - 6.5. Harder jet forms by carbon compression in salt water, while carbon compression in fresh water makes a softer less dense jet.
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A singular type of jet is mined in Turkey. Oltu stone, named for the region in which it's found, is a smoky black stone which is naturally soft, and hardens on exposure to air. It's also called Turkish black amber.
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Jet of any kind is created through millions of years of extreme pressure on decaying wood. The trees of today's jet come from the Early Jurassic period, c. 202 million years ago. The pressure of surface weight and upheavals like buckling or folding create conditions for jet.
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Ideally the compressed wood comes from trees of the family Araucariaceae, evergreens once found throughout the northern and southern hemispheres. Their descendants live today in southern regions.
Araucariaceae can grow to great heights. A New Zealand kauri tree (Agathis australis) named Tāne Mahuta ("The Lord of the Forest") measures 45 m (148 ft) tall with a diameter at chest height of 491 cm (16 ft).
Jet is used as jewelry, protective magic and paint pigment by early people. Black is a color of mystery and also definition, as it's often found in the lines of prehistoric caves paintings. It's associated with magic and the night.
Early artists grind coals like jet down into a black powder pigment. Binders include water, animal fat or wax. In the Neolithic and earlier, pigments like jet and lignite are used as face and body paint, decor and art.
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Jet contains about 75% carbon and 12% oxygen. The rest is sulfur, hydrogen and other elements which can effect the look, density, color or sheen of the stone. When rubbed jet might produce static electricity, a point in common with the petrified tree resin amber.
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Jet is especially desirable as mourning jewelry in Victorian times. Wearing dark colors for mourning is a practice of early Rome. The popularity of black at funerals and in mourning begins in the Western world with the death of Albert, beloved husband of Queen Victoria.
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Victoria wears black until her own death 40 years later. An entire culture grows around the wearing of black for grief. Mourning can continue for many years. Vast mourning warehouses spring up, selling black dye, clothing, draperies, bed sheets, jewelry and more.
Women especially follow the mourning fashions. Many dye their entire wardrobes black. There's nobility in grief. Black crepe is the norm for grieving widows, even if it's likely to burst into flames. It's common to carry a lock of the deceased's hair in a brooch or locket.
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In the mid-19th century, the first synthetic black dyes and pigments appear. Aniline black is discovered in the 1830s. In 1863 it receives a patent in the UK. At the same time, other synthetic pigments are being developed.
Before then, from the 14th - 19th century, the oak apple or gall-nut, a tumor growing on oak trees, is a main source of black dye and black writing ink. The tumor is a reaction of the tree to an infesting insect.
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The gall-nut is ground to powder, then simmered for about an hour and strained. The black liquid produced can be used for clothing dye or black ink. Before gall-nut black, people use charcoal from the fire or boiled crushed walnut shells.
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