The Dark Ages: Islamic Empire

Qabus ibn Voshmgir had his coffin made of rock crystal, it’s a very special substance, isn’t it? According to the Koran, when the chosen arrive in Paradise, they will be given drinks of ginger, served in goblets of crystal. Crystal, or rock crystal to be more specific, was a substance with which Islam seem to have a special affinity. They say it was Ahmed Ibn Tulun himself who introduced the art of carving rock crystals into Egypt. What is certain is that it was in Egypt that this difficult art reached perfection.

I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of many substances in the world with a presence as magical as rock crystal. Particularly when it has passed through the hands of the master carvers of Islam.

Only a handful of these gorgeous Islamic ewers have survived. And that just makes them feel even more precious.

Rock crystal itself is actually very common. It’s just a type of quartz, and quartz is the most common mineral in the Earth’s crust. You get it everywhere.

What isn’t common is pieces of quartz so pure and perfect and transparent that they satisfy the demands of the great crystal carvers of Islam.

No-one has ever carved rock crystal more finely than this. What they do is find a perfect lump of crystal and shape it on the outside, and then begin hollowing out the inside. They’d hollow it further and further and further, until in the very best Islamic art, the walls of the crystal were only a couple of millimetres thick. Now, that was unbelievably difficult.

The shimmering image carved into these gorgeous crystal ewers would transport the drinker to Paradise. Hunting scenes, flowers, beautiful birds, so crystal clear that none could resist them.

And it wasn’t just Islam that saw something magical in this rock crystal. In Ireland, when Ireland were still pagan, they used to put pieces of rock crystal at the entrance of their burial chambers.

And in Egypt, they carved it into perfect spheres, which apparently kept your hands cool when you touched it. And of course, it was used for telling the future, and it still is.

All sorts of Dark Age societies were fascinated by rock crystal. The Roman naturalist, Pliny the Elder, believed that rock crystal was actually frozen water, trapped for aeons under the glaciers. Even the early Christians worshipped it. For them, rock crystal had a natural relationship with divine perfection. So they’d put it on the outside of their reliquaries and up and their golden crosses, where it’s perfect presence seemed somehow to connect them to God.

Christian Rock Crystal has a different feel to it. In Christian hands the light-filled paradise of Islam seem to fill up with shadows. With Christian rock crystal, the Dark Ages are what you expect them to be – mysterious, spooky and talismanic.