Lapis Jewelry

Native American Lapis Jewelry for Sale!

Here is our entire online selection of Lapis Jewelry. Displayed in this section are all pieces of jewelry in which the featured stone is Lapis, as well as any pieces of jewelry that merely have Lapis accents.
Lapis Lazuli, more commonly known as just “lapis”, is a deep blue semi-precious stone that has been prized for thousands of years because of its intense & vibrant blue color. Lapis was among the first gemstones to be used as an adornment and worn as jewelry.
Lapis Lazuli consists mainly of diopside and lazurite. Lapis came about millions of years ago during the metamorphosis of lime to marble. The blue color comes from the sulfur content of the lazurite, and the excitingly beautiful flecks of ‘gold’ are actually iron pyrite.
Such a BEAUTIFUL blue stone, Lapis works with almost any skin tone, hair color, and almost any attire. Lapis Lazuli is one of the most versatile and popular gemstones in the world, and Lapis jewelry has shown extraordinary stability in the fickle and turbulent trends of fashion. We love hand-crafted Native American jewelry with Lapis, and we hope you do too!

Lapis Jewelry History

Lapis Lazuli was being mined in Afghanistan possibly as early as 7,000 BC. Still, to this day, the best raw stones come from the steep & extreme Hindu Kush mountains in NorthEast Afghanistan. Extracted from very inhospitable mountains by blasting and pick-axe, Lapis rocks are brought down into the valley during the summer months with the aide of mules. Lapis is also found in Chile, and Pakistan; and much smaller amounts of Lapis Lazuli can also found in Russia, Mongolia, Italy, the USA, and Canada. Today, most Lapis is still made into lovely jewelry!
This beautiful deep blue stone has been popular for thousands of years among the people of Greece, Rome, Mesopotamia, and Egypt (Lapis was used for the eyebrows on King Tutankhamun’s funeral mask (1323 BC)). At excavations of ancient burials & ruins in these areas, archaeologists have repeatedly found Lapis figurines, jewelry, and decorations among the grave furnishings.
Obviously the history of Lapis is VERY rich, and goes well beyond jewelry. Another example is how, at the end of the Middle Ages, Lapis Lazuli also served a great importance in Europe. Lapis was ground into a powder and made into ‘ultramarine’, the finest and most expensive blue pigment, to be used by the most skilled & influential painters of the Renaissance and Baroque,