T is for Traces of Tourmaline (Gemstone Folklore)

Welcome to the 2022 A to Z Blogging Challenge! My theme this year is Gemstone Folklore. Because I love stories about shiny things. Read the introduction to the project here.

TOURMALINE

Tourmaline is a very complex silicate mineral that comes in many colors - pink, red, yellow, green, blue, or even black. It crystallizes is long, slender prismatic columns, some of which can be more than one color - like the famous "watermelon tourmaline", which is green on the outside, and pink on the inside.

The Argonauts on the Island of Elba

Greek myth

The Argonautica is an ancient Greek myth of a group of heroes that set out on an epic journey to reclaim the Golden Fleece from faraway Colchis. Under the leadership of Jason, the ship Argo is filled with the most famous heroes of its day - including Heracles, Orpheus, Atalanta, Castor and Pollux, and many others. The most well-known iteration of the story is the epic written down by Apollonius of Rhodes in the 3rd century BCE.

In AR's version, the heroes take a very convoluted route on the way home from the Black Sea. They sail up the Danube, then cross to the Adriatic (the author thought they were connected), then sail up the Po and cross over to the Tyrrhenian Sea. At one point, they land on the island of Aethalia (Elba), and organize races on the beach. As the many heroes compete against each other in various sports, their sweat splatters on the beach, staining the rocks with dark, round spots that have been visible ever since.

The rocks on the beach below the Capo Bianco cliffs are white, stained with round, blue and black spots of tourmaline. Fun fact: the dark marks were associated with sweat stains because Greek athletes usually scraped dirt/sand and sweat off themselves with specific instruments (strigils) and flung them to the ground.

Sources: Read the text of the Argonautica here. The image below is from this article. Read a long reserch article on this myth in this book.

Other stories: Read a more recent legend from San Diego about tourmalines here.

Are you familiar with the myth of the Argonauts? 

Do you have a favorite part or character?