God for us to design products, we are the porters of nature!
Catherine I, wife of Peter the Great, who named Ekaterinburg in her honor, first paid attention to the development of the precious-stone industry in the Urals; and two of the amethyst mines near Mursinka are to this day called Taljan, a corruption of Italian, she having sent two Italian lapidaries to this region for the purpose of developing the gem resources, founding the lapidary works and establishing an industry which gives employment to at least 1,000 people in this remote region at the present time.
The chief gem districts of the Urals are all within one hundred miles of Ekaterinburg, some eight or ten miles apart. In this limited territory there are over 100 mines or localities where minerals and gem stones of more or less value and great variety are extracted. The rocks comprise a number of kinds of granites, gneisses and related types, some of them quite peculiar, and are seamed and penetrated with granitic veins and dikes, giving evidence of great disturbance and frequent igneous intrusion. Among the more valuable gem minerals here found are sapphire corundum, in some cases of beautiful blue, occurring in a peculiar rock composed of corundum and orthoclase feldspar; topaz crystals, in cavities in true granite veins, with rich green amazon-stone and quartz crystals – a combination suggestive of some of our own Colorado localities; zircon, beryl, phenacite, and a host of other interesting minerals less familiar but sometimes very beautiful as specimens or ornamental stones, or valuable for economic uses in the arts.
Kunz' description starts with the celebrated malachite deposit of the Mednorudyanskoye Copper Deposit at Nizhnii Tagil:
A little distance southward, close to the base of the mountain, is the celebrated copper mine of Mednoroudiansk, from which nearly all the malachite used in the world has come, a circumstance that has made this locality famous. It is unfortunate that the name Nijni Tagilsk, which really belongs to the adjacent iron mine, should have become so identified with the malachite, in mineralogical books and collections, — that the error can probably never be corrected. The occurrence of the ores is peculiar and interesting; the iron is in beds and seams closely involved among the porphyritic rocks, in such a manner that Professor Tschernitschew, the eminent authority who has described these mines for the recent Congress of Geologists, regards them as of simultaneous formation with the igneous rocks in which they occur. The copper mine forms an ellipse 1,800 feet long and 290 feet broad, and the ores occur in ferruginous clay, apparently formed by an alteration of beds of tufa or breccia derived from the porphyries and other adjacent rocks, and included between upturned beds of Devonian limestone.
In 1835, an enormous mass of malachite was struck in mining at Nijni Tagilsk, at a depth of over 200 feet, and beneath the bed of a small stream, known as the Roudianka. This great mass or block, when disengaged from the surrounding rock, measured some 17 feet by 8, with a thickness sloping from about 6 feet at one end to a little over 1 foot at the other. Its total weight, including portions cut off in extricating it, was estimated at 65,000 kilograms. The block was surrounded and partly penetrated by iron and manganese ores ; but large portions of it were compact malachite, of reniform structure, beautifully varied with light and dark green. The inflow of water rendered it difficult to determine what lay below the mass; but it was thought that perhaps this was only the upper portion of a more extensive body of malachite. The largest mass previously found was in the Gournichef mine, and weighed 1,789 kilograms...
Malachite
.
.
One of the favorite ornamental gem materials of the Russian nobility was rhodonite, which was produced in considerable volume near Ekaterinburg. The principal source was the Malosedel'nikovskoe deposit in Sedel'nikovo, although several other rhodonite sources apparently existed in the Ekaterinburg region.
The sarcophagus of which Kunz speaks was that of Maria Alexandrovna, wife of Czar Alexander II, who had died in 1880. In 1887, her son Czar Alexander III gave instructions that her marble tomb was to be replaced with a tomb hewn out of a solid block of Urals rhodonite. The imperial Peterhof Lapidary immediately set to work on the project, which ultimately took 18 years. In 1906, the new rhodonite tomb was installed in Peter-and-Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg, historically the burial site of many Czars, Czarinas, and little Czardines.
Kunz observed:
Rhodonite (silicate of manganese), in greater quantity and of finer color than anywhere else in the world, is found in the Ural Mountains, in the village of Sedelnikowja, thirteen miles southwest from Ekaterinburg, and at Malazidelinki, some eight miles farther. Its color varies from the richest deep warm pink to a reddish brown. Chemically, it is composed of silica and manganese; and it is almost always associated with pyrolusite and psilomelane, black oxides of manganese, which mark and streak the stone, frequently adding greatly to its beauty. Its hardness is nearly 6-5, about that of the harder varieties of feldspar and of jade, although not so tough as the latter.
Nearly all the rhodonite of commerce is brought from this Russian locality, where it is found by the ton. Pieces of fine pink color without the black streaks of oxide of manganese are exceptionally rare, so much so that when the late Empress of Russia, who was very fond of it, ordered, it is said, a piece cut the size and shape of an egg, that was to be free from all blemishes or black streaks, over one ton was cut for this purpose without obtaining enough for the desired piece...
Rhodonite
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One single block of rhodonite weighed 1,500 poods, or 54,000 pounds... These may seem immense blocks of stone, but in 1869 a mass of rhodonite was brought to the Ekaterinburg Works weighing 2,850 poods (102,600 pounds). It was transported on immense sledges made of iron and wood, and was drawn by ninety horses, or, more strictly speaking, by thirty troikas tied together, one after the other. These were driven by more than fifty men, who shrieked, whistled, swore and beat the horses, and an entire week was required to transport the stone from the mine at the town of Sedelnikowja, about fourteen miles southwest, to Ekaterinburg, a rate of about two miles a day.
One of the most remarkable pieces of lapidary work ever attempted is the sarcophagus of rhodonite now in process of making for the widow of the late Czar, Alexander II. The block weighs 800 poods, or 28,800 pounds. This may require at least ten years more to complete.
The occurrence of the diamond in the Urals has for a long time been questioned. In a collection at Nijni Tagilsk I saw a small white crystal weighing 1/3 of a carat, a twinned hexoctahedron, which was pronounced phenacite by a local mineralogist, who had taken its specific gravity; but which is, as the writer identified, a small opalescent white diamond, similar to those found at the Bagogem mine in Brazil. It was found in a small brook, near the village of Kalstchi. The existence of pyrope garnets here, and their frequent finding, seems to sustain the theory of their origin, although some of the Russians are quite sure that the Russian who found the diamonds for Humboldt had really deceived him.
At Kornilowog, and near the village of Chitanka, in the washing for gold, transparent corundum is found in the form of sapphires of pale blue color, also yellow, and rubies, light red, sometimes streaked with blue, resembling the Ceylonese rather than the Burmese, and green sapphires associated with fine ruby-red pyrope garnets, blue chalcedony, transparent zircon, quartz, etc. A ruby or sapphire worth $100 is of exceedingly rare occurrence, although many are found that sell for from 1 to 20 roubles each.
The Izumrudnye Kopi or Malyshevskoe Emerald Mines were first discovered in January 1831 when a peasant named Maxim Kozhevnikov who was employed as a “charcoal burner” (wood cutter in charge of supplying wood for the production of charcoal) found an emerald in the roots of a tree overtuned by a storm.
In addition to superb emeralds, the deposit produced beryl var. aquamarine, chrysoberyl var. alexandrite, and is the type locality for phenacite.
The “alexandrite” variety of chrysoberyl is inexorably linked to Russia and the imperial family. There are several variants of the legend of the naming of alexandrite. One story claims that it was first discovered in the emerald mines near Ekaterinberg in 1830 on the birthday of young Alexander, future Czar of Russia; this is impossible, since the emerald mines were not discovered until the next year. It is also claimed that the first specimens of alexandrite were discovered on Alexander's birthday in 1834, and was named in his honor in 1842. More plausibly, it appears that the first specimens were recovered about 1833 and sent to Finnish mineralogist Nils Gustaf Nordenskjold by Count Lev Aleksevich Perovskii (a mineral and gem collector who apparently was second in charge of the management of the Czar's estates, and for whom the mineral perovskite was named). Nordenskjold initially thought the material to be simply another specimen of emerald from the new deposit; it was not until he observed the unique color change in artificial light, and its greater hardness than beryl, that the material piqued his interest. Eventually realizing that the material was a rather remarkable variety of chrysoberyl, Nordenskjold initially proposed the name “diphanite” for the new gem material. However, Perovskii announced it as “alexandrite,” on April 17, 1834, the day future Czar Alexander II reached his 16th birthday, thus ingratiating himself with his benefactor. Nordenskjold did not publish a description of the mineral until 1842. It has been reported that one of the finest specimens of chrysoberyl produced by the deposit was a cluster of 22 deeply colored crystals forming a 25 x 14 x 11cm grouping on matrix.
Of the deposits Kunz wrote:
The emeralds, alexandrites and phenacites of the Urals are all from one small region, on the right bank of the Bolchoi Reft, a little north of Takowaja, fifty-one miles northeast of Ekaterinburg and quite apart from the other localities in Perm.
The emerald mines consist of four large groups of mines and a number of smaller workings; starting a little north of Takowaja, running north and west a distance of some seventeen wersts, or ten miles.
The Troitzk mine is about the central one of the group; the excavations are 1,000 feet in length and 200 feet in width, with shaft holes, wheels, etc., as the evidences of deep, extensive workings. These mines were operated by Pavlevsky, and also under the crown.
The Lubinsky mine, also a crown working, is two wersts north of Takowaja; the rock here is principally mica schist interspersed with actinolite and talcose schist. At the Krasnobolskaia, ten wersts south of Troitzk mine, the old shafts, drifts and workings indicate a vast amount of labor formerly carried on. This is the locality that has furnished the alexandrites and phenacites, as well as emeralds.
Beryl var. Emerald
.
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The Marienski emerald mines, seven wersts (five miles) north of Troitzk, are marked by several workings over 200 feet in diameter.
Among the associated minerals I observed quartz, feldspar, mica schist and chlorophane. This is the chlorophane mentioned by Pallas, so highly phosphorescent and sensitive that it emitted light by the heat of the hand.
These mines were systematically operated fifty or sixty years ago, at an annual rental to the Government of 60,000 roubles ($45,000) — a charge which finally led to their abandonment, because the mining did not pay at so high a rental. Fine roads were laid to the great Siberian Street, twenty-one miles distant, and mining was conducted on an immense scale; for a distance of some ten miles along the course of the emerald veins, in a line running northeast and southwest, shafts were sunk and tunnels were driven in the talcose schist and mica slate in which were found the fine gems. Strange to say, although now these mines have not been worked for over forty years, and are carefully guarded by the imperial woodkeepers, we see from them to this day single gems for sale in Ekaterinburg, some of them valued at $300 each. It is hard to believe that these are from the original workings of the mine. Possibly they are sold by peasants, who have found them in re-working the old dumps, or who secretly work the mines when they are not watched.
Phenacite
.
Here also was first found the mineral phenacite, which received its name from phenos, meaning deceiver, and lithos, a stone, because it was long mistaken for white topaz. It is one of the most brilliant white gems known, but lacks the play of color possessed by the diamond. It was formerly found in connection with alexandrite, a chrome-green variety of chrysoberyl, which exhibits the property of changing from a green by daylight to a columbine or raspberry-red by artificial light. It was named alexandrite in honor of the Czar, Alexander II, by Nordenskiold, in 1842, who discovered it in the then famous emerald mines at Takowaja.
Chrysoberyl var. Alexandrite
.
The alexandrites when cut as gems weigh from 1/8 of a carat up to (very rarely) 5 carats each, though crystals and groups of crystals weighing 20 pounds have been found, so rare is it to obtain perfect pieces even in the large crystals.
In addition to emerald and chrysoberyl, the Izumrudnye Kopi or Malyshevskoe Emerald Mines produced fine specimens of gemmy aquamarine. According to Kunz:
Here have been found marvellous crystals of transparent aquamarine, notably the one found on November 19 (December 1), 1828. This is a dark asparagus-green crystal, weighing 6½ pounds, brilliantly transparent, doubly terminated and beautifully marked with etched planes. It was acquired by the museum of the Imperial Mining Institute of St. Petersburg, and was then valued at 43,000 roubles, equalling at the present time $23,000.
Beryl var Aquamarine
Beryl var. Heliodor
At Lewaschinagorka, one mile east of Alabashka, there was found in 1888 a fine yellow crystal of beryl, 5 inches in length and weighing 8 ounces, of a beautiful golden color. Another beryl was found in the mountain of Zolotonah, near the village of Ujakova. This measured 5 inches in length, 2 inches in the widest part and 2 1/10 in its narrowest. It is doubly terminated, with a basal plane at one end, and with pyramidal faces at the other. It is a beautiful sea-green color and showing at the face the pyramid, a slightly fibrous structure is developed. It weighs 436½ grams, almost 1 pound avoirdupois. Both these beryls are now in the remarkable collection of Russian minerals belonging to Harvard University.
Lewaschinagorka is about a mile east of Alabashka, in the Biserk (district) Alaraensky. A working, irregular in shape, 1,000 feet long and 40 to 50 feet deep, and 50 to 60 feet wide has been made here. It was at this locality that the writer obtained the large yellow beryl crystal, now in the Garland Collection at Harvard University, was found. The rock here is pegmatite.
Kunz also noted the output of the Alabashka pegmatite field near Yuzhakovo Village, well known for the superb topaz specimens it produced:
Beautiful blue, sea-green and white and sherry-colored topazes, generally transparent, are found at Alabashka and adjoining localities in Perm, some crystals weighing from a few ounces to 4 pounds each, notably a 4-pound one now in Harvard University, in the collection before referred to. There was a great yield in 1880 to 1882, producing many hundreds of crystals absolutely transparent and furnishing gems weighing over an ounce each, at Alabashka, which is situated on a small river of the same name. A number of excavations here have been made varying from 50 to 500 feet in length.
Topaz
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The Sarapulka (Murzinka) District was producing red elbaite (“rubellite”) at the time of Kunz's visit.
Black tourmaline occurs, plentifully interspersed in the orthoclase of all the gem-bearing veins of this district.
The famous red tourmalines — rubellites — formerly obtained from Chitanka and now from Sarapulka, and one or two other localities, are the most magnificent ever found as crystals, although they rarely afford gems.
Schorl
Rubellite
At Sarapulka, in the Bizerk of Rejscheski, there are two localities, about 100 feet apart, on the side of a hill, which is one of a number, none of them higher than 100 feet, in a beautiful fertile rolling country. One of these mines was opened over a century ago; the other in 1841. At this place the excavations are now 150 feet wide, and at a depth of 30 feet a shaft is sunk in one of them. Numerous small workings are about it.
The variety of Andradite known as “Demantoid” (“like a diamond”) was first named by Finnish mineralogist Nordenskjold, cited above in the section on alexandrite. The material was originally thought to be a form of olivine, and was often sold under the name “olivine” or “Uralian emerald” in the western gem trade in the late 19th Century.
One of the most beautiful of all gems, and one that was not known two decades ago, is the demantoid (green garnet), or "Uralian emerald," erroneously extensively sold as olivine, found at Poldnewaja near Syssersk, in the Government of Orenburg.
Demantoid
This form of garnet varies from yellowish-green to a most intense emerald-green, and possesses a high power of refracting light, showing a distinct fire like the diamond or zircon, so much so that in the evening it has almost the appearance of a green diamond. It is found as rounded nodules in a curious serpentine-like rock, and also as loose grains in the gold washings, selling in small gems (the most desired) for almost the price of diamonds of the same size.
Euclase (not the blue variety)
.
The rare mineralogical deep blue gem, euclase, has been found for the past forty years in the gold washings on the River Sanarka, associated with cyanite, for which it was at first mistaken. In 1889 superb sapphire-blue euclases, one a crystal 7½ centimeters long, were found here, one of which was cut into a gem of 4 carats, and sold for over $500.
Today, “Siberian” still remains the descriptor used for the finest and most desirable purple amethysts. Kunz states:
Perhaps the most magnificent gems from the Urals are the wonderful royal purple amethysts, changing to red by artificial light, that are found at about forty localities in the Government of Perm. For intensity of color and perfection of quality, and one might say majestic beauty, these rival almost any other colored gem. A series of them was exhibited at the World's Fair at Paris, in 1889, five of which were presented to the Czarina by the peasant who found them. Two of these measured nearly 2 inches across, and are royal purple by day, changing to rich red wine-color by artificial light, as do nearly all the Uralian amethysts.
Quartz var. Amethyst
.
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Kunz' notes on the production of smokey quartz and citrine are especially interesting for their comments on post-mining tretament. The peasants had learned how to heat treat quartz to produce citrine, and also had evolved a mechanism to prevent thermal shock from destroying quartz containing carbon dioxide inclusions.
Besides the purple quartz, or amethyst, other colored varieties of quartz occur, and mention may be made of the smoky shades, which may be altered by heat to rich deep yellow, forming the so-called quartz topazes.
Quartz
.
M. Kleiner says that the miners in the Government of Perm found that crystals of quartz and smoky quartz when taken from the ground and exposed to the air frequently became filled with rents, flaws and turbidity; but that if, immediately upon finding, the crystals were packed in damp sand or other material, and then put in a box and allowed to remain for one or more years in the cellars of their houses — which in the Urals are very warm — their color would not change as it did if exposed at once to the air. This is probably due to the fact that the crystals contain large quantities of liquid carbonic acid, and that at the temperature at which they are taken out, generally in spring or winter, the cavities would explode; whereas, by covering with sand, the same temperature they were found in was preserved.
Kleiner also states that to impart to the smoky quartz a golden yellow color, the peasants would put them in a loaf of bread and then bake them in the oven. When the color was not sufficiently changed, they were baked three or four times. He remarks, however, that the crystals often exploded before they changed color, which fact would substantiate the view that they exploded through the agency of the presence of carbonic acid gas that produced the turbid marking and rents on exposure to the low temperatures.
Like rhodonite and malachite, blocks of jasper found routine use in ornamental carvings in imperial Russia. Jasper was considered worthy of great works, and indeed the sarcophagus of Czar Alexander II was carved from a solid block of green jasper.
Nowhere else in the world is jasper so abundant, and found in such endless varieties of color; it is obtained principally in the Government of Orenburg. One of the most highly prized colors is a rich gray-green; and also red, mottled with yellow and green, which form an endless series of combinations. It also is found in beautiful colors in the Guberline Mountains, near the city of Werchne Uralsk, 100 miles south of Zlatoust. A superb green jasper is obtained from the River Achtuba and from the River Ohra.
The jasper found in the Kalkansky Mountains, ninety-five miles from the city of Ohrsk, in the Urals, is of a gray to a grayish-green color, with a very fine-grained texture, and is an ideal substance for lapidary work. The most delicate touch of the wheel or graver is perceptible. The stone admits of a high polish, but the texture is so fine that a dull or mat surface is equally beautiful. It may be likened to a rich gray putty, on which the slightest touch of a razor-edge remains as a true impression. The contrasts between the polished and dull surfaces afford opportunity for very beautiful effects. This is one of the most highly prized of Russian ornamental stones.
I was present when a dish of Kalkansky jasper was presented by the city of Tscheliabinsk, in the Government of Orenburg, to the Czarevitch, on the second of August, 1891, at a reception given him at Troitzk (the first city out of the steppes), on his return from the great trip across Siberia.
This dish, which was 18 inches in diameter, represented a fluted platter, entirely covered with grape leaves, most of which were arranged or laid on so as to have the under or pale side up. At the edges, however, the leaves were turned up and over, so that in looking down on the dish the leaves all around the edge showed their bright upper side to a height of 2 inches, thus forming a border. The outer and upper edges, as well as the veinings on all the leaves, were polished, while the lower side of the leaves that was visible was dull. The grayish-green color of the Kalkansky jasper when unpolished exactly simulates the dull tint of a grape leaf. Several men were steadily employed for one whole year on this dish alone.
With this was also a small salt-cellar, similarly made of grape leaves, the stems of the leaves serving for feet, to carry out the ancient custom, of presenting royalty with bread and salt on entering a city.
Kunz had the opportunity to inspect the Imperial Lapidary Works, one of the leading centers of the lapidary arts in the world.
The Russian Czars have taken pains to develop the industries connected with these valuable and beautiful materials, and have founded great establishments for cutting and polishing ornamental stones, at which a kind and amount of work has been produced that is not equalled in the world. Chief among these are the Peterhoff Lapidary Works, at St. Petersburg, the immense establishment at Ekaterinburg, in the Urals, and the lapidary works at Kolivan, in Siberia.
Of these great Government workshops and their products, it is fitting that some account should be given here.
Many small and choice objects, as well as fine mosaic work of hard stone rivalling anything ever produced elsewhere, are made at the Peterhoff Lapidary building, established by Catherine II in 1775; situated between the new and old Peterhoff palaces, about forty minutes' ride from St. Petersburg. It is a three-story building with palatial interior decorations. The central hall is 150 feet square, and the entire building is an example of imperial magnificence. One is surprised to find marble staircases, marble floors, fine high ceilings, and the most elaborate machinery for stone-work. One floor is entirely filled with glass cases containing stones to be worked up in the building. Here are expended annually 40,000 rubles, with sixty-four permanent and eleven temporary workmen.
Entry Gate of the Peterhof lapidary works circa 1910
The Imperial Lapidary Works
The lapidary work of the Ural materials is all executed either at the Imperial Lapidary Works, at Ekaterinburg, or in the vicinity by the lapidary-masters, as they are termed, who employ the workmen or apprentices, each having his own peculiar style. The product of these latter is sold to the dealers at Ekaterinburg, who visit the Nijni Novgorod, Moscow and Ekaterinburg fairs.
The Czars have always manifested great interest in these lapidary works; and at Ekaterinburg is still on exhibition, preserved in a glass case, the cutting-tool used by the Emperor Alexander I, who worked here more or less, and became quite an expert lapidary.
Imperial Lapidary Works
A training-school connected with these works was started in 1877. At present there are fifty-five boys as pupils, who draw and design for nine months in the year, from nine to eleven o'clock, have one hour for recreation, and then model till two o'clock. The graduates have the option, either of remaining as lapidaries in the Government works, or of becoming master-workmen on their own account.
The lapidary works at Ekaterinburg, founded in 1765, and at Kolivan, in the heart of Siberia, in 1787, are so situated that they have command of an immense water-power by which they are run. These works are on a large scale, so that enormous masses of hard stone can be as readily worked as marble is throughout Europe. Those at Kolivan, in the Government of Tomsk, deal chiefly with stones from the Altai Mountains.
Many of the machines are of a primitive character, and have not been changed during the past century. But the facilities for sawing and for drilling of large columns, for ornamenting or for lightening large masses of stone, for channeling, grooving, polishing, etc., are ingenious, and are manipulated with the greatest skill. The annual product of these two establishments amounts to some $35,000, and is entirely for Government use, either in the palaces and public buildings, or for imperial gifts.
Planing machine
Planing Machine
The various forms of lapidary work may be divided into three classes. First, the manufacture of vases, dishes and paperweights, often of large size, but invariably made of jasper, rhodonite, malachite, lapis lazuli, aventurine or the like. When the objects are of malachite or lapis lazuli, the body is made of slate or other readily-worked stone and then veneered with a thin coating of these more precious substances. Jewel-caskets, seals and small charms are made either plain or fluted, or are ornamented with leaves, scrollwork or other devices; also seals and cameo-work, such as animals and busts of prominent persons, as the reigning Czar, Turgenieff, etc.
Stone Sawing Machine
Grinding and Polishing Machinery
Second, the manufacture of objects of a peculiar kind of mosaic work, somewhat in the Florentine style, and yet very different, made of such stones as perfectly simulate berries, fruits, leaves or flowers. The unique feature which distinguishes this work is that while mosaics, properly so called, are flat and inlaid, here the objects are represented in their actual form and size. The favorite designs are fruit groups, which are so accurately matched in color and carved in form that they are exact reproductions in stone of the real fruits, resting upon a dish or pedestal of jasper or black marble. Thus, for raspberries, rhodonite of dark pink color is used; for red.or black cherries, a peculiar colored sard and black onyx; for white currants, rock-crystal spheres, slightly smoky, which are cut hollow in the center, and the inner parts are so engraved as to simulate perfectly the seeds. The leaves are generally made of noble serpentine. For grapes, a peculiar-colored sard, black onyx or dark purple amethyst is used; black onyx for blackberries, and a yellow jasper for mulberries; and these fruits are generally massed on pieces of jasper, or placed on jasper dishes, and are marvellous for their exactness as to the color, lustre and form of the natural fruit.
Third, the cutting of facetted stones for jewelry, such as aquamarine, sapphire, ruby, topaz and quartz of various colors, and the royal amethyst from Chitanka and Mursinka.
The Ekaterinburg Lapidary Works at present employ seventy-five men, receiving 25 roubles per month each ($12.50), and ten boys at from 2 to 10 roubles each per month ($1 to $5). Forty thousand roubles are annually expended here.In 1830 there were 150 men employed. All the designs for these works are made at Peterhoff. A wax model, the exact size of the object, is made by expert modellers and then handed to the lapidaries to copy. The original designs are returned to St. Petersburg, to remain secret in the cabinet of the Czar.
Lapidaries at Work
Lapidary at Work
In August, 1891, there were at least 36,000 poods, or over 1,000,000 pounds, of rhodonite, jaspers of various colors, jade and other allied hard stones, at the Ekaterinburg Works.
It is only on reaching the finishing-room of the great lapidary works that one realizes the imperial grandeur of what is accomplished here. A pair of magnificent Kalkansky jasper vases and pedestals, measuring six feet in height, occupied the time of half a dozen or more men for six whole years.
In 1840 there was finished a large elliptical jasper vase, now in the Winter Palace at St. Petersburg. It is one meter in diameter, and required just twenty-five years to complete. Time seems to be no object; there is no haste. Everything goes to the Czar, either for the adornment of his palaces or as imperial gifts; and whatever is not up to the standard is sold. The two imperial lapidary works are run at a cost of 80,000 to 100,000 roubles annually, paid from the private revenue of the Emperor. A monument of green jasper was also made for her, which was brought from the Altai Mountains in Siberia.
These establishments have made Russia famous for wonderful objects of this kind, nearly all of which are of imperial character. Among the more notable of these may be mentioned the two vases of Siberian aventurine (oriental sunstone), a quartz containing brilliant spangles of mica, one of which was presented to Sir Roderick Murchison, and is now at the Royal School of Mines, in London, and the other to Alexander von Humboldt, and now in the Mineralogical Museum of the University of Berlin, in recognition of the services done by these two eminent scientists in their travels in the Urals. Dishes, mantels, tables and other objects made of lapis lazuli and of malachite, are to be seen in the Louvre, at Petit Trianon, and at the royal palaces throughout Europe; and the celebrated columns veneered with lapis lazuli and malachite, over twenty feet high, at St. Isaac's Cathedral, and the immense dishes at the Ermitage and other palaces in St. Petersburg.
The Alexander Column was designed by Montferrand, in 1834, at the command of Emperor Nicolas I. This column, of polished red granite from Finland, is 82½ feet high, 13 feet 3 inches in diameter, and rests on a polished block of red Finland granite, 26½ feet square. It is surmounted by a bronze angel 13 feet high, holding a cross 10 feet high, and crushing a serpent underfoot.
In the porticoes of St. Isaac's Cathedral are over forty-eight polished columns of red Finland granite, 56 feet high and 6.6 feet in diameter, resting on immense steps of polished granite, each of a single piece.
The west entrance of the Ermitage is supported by eight pilasters, against each of which leans a dark-gray granite polished figure from Sserdobol. Each pilaster is 19.8 feet high, supporting the roof. These are only a suggestion to the wonderful interior,—one hundred and twenty columns, all of which are of marble, granite, jasper or other costly material.
The finest collections of Russian minerals are in the Imperial Mining School, in the Imperial Academy of Science, and the Kotchubey Collection in St. Petersburg, the Koks-charow Collection in the British Museum, the Duke of Leuchtenberg Collection in the Mineralogisches Institute at Munich; and, in the United States, in the collections of Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass., the Field Columbian Museum, Chicago, that of Mr. Clarence S. Bement, and the late W. S. Vaux and Mr. George Vaux, of Philadelphia; also in the American Museum of Natural History, and the School of Mines Collection, New York, and in the National Museum at Washington, D. C.
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