Genuine Native American Catlinite

N/A

Transparent

lightfastness 8/8

Granulation: medium

Catlinite is a pinkish-brown earth native to North America .Because of its very fine graininess it is easily workable and was used by Native Americans to make pipes and calumets

The painter and writer Catlin reports how in certain Indian ritual customs great importance was given to the calumets whose stove was formed by a particular dark red stone that came from a unique quarry located between the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, in southwestern Minnesota.

The place where the quarry of this stone was located, which Catlin called pipestone, was considered sacred by the Indians, as they believed it to be the substance from which man had created in the Great Spirit.