Shungite comes from one place on earth, and I think that is the most interesting thing about it.

The stone is found near Lake Onega in Karelia, Russia, close to a village called Shunga, which is where the name comes from. It has been there for around two billion years. That makes it far older than almost anything else I sell, and far older than most life on the planet. It is not mined anywhere else in any quantity, so every piece of shungite you see anywhere, mine included, started as rock in that one region.

It is not really a mineral either. It is a rock, and what makes it unusual is how much carbon is in it. There are two grades, and they behave quite differently.

Ordinary shungite is somewhere between thirty and fifty per cent carbon. It looks like a dark grey or black stone, fairly matte, and it is what most shungite on the market is made of.

Elite shungite, which some sellers call noble shungite, is a different thing. It is up to ninety-five per cent carbon or more. It is glassy rather than dull, often with a silvery sheen, and it breaks with a smooth curved surface rather than a gritty one. Only around one per cent of the shungite that comes out of the ground is Elite grade, which is why my small pieces start at £2 and the pendants are £35. Same region, same rock, very different material.

The reason shungite is talked about at all is the discovery in 1985 that it contains fullerenes. Those are a form of carbon shaped like tiny closed cages, and finding them in a natural rock rather than in a laboratory was remarkable enough to earn a Nobel Prize for the chemists who first made them. In Russia it has a much older reputation than that. 

Peter the Great had a spa built at the Karelian springs in the 1719 and the water there was used by his court and his soldiers, and the local use of shungite water goes back long before him.

Traditionally associated with

Shungite is traditionally associated with clearing and with protection, and both of those come out of its Russian history. In Russia it is a stone you put in water and a stone you keep at the door.

How I look after it

Shungite is soft, somewhere around a three and a half to four, so it scratches far more easily than quartz or agate. Store it on its own, in a pouch or a box, rather than loose in a bowl with other stones.

A soft dry cloth is all it needs. Keep it away from perfume, hairspray and household cleaners, and keep the pendulum point away from anything hard, because the tip will chip.

In my shop

The Shungite Elite pieces are £2 each, around 2cm, and they vary in shape, so the one you receive is chosen at random. If you want a pendant, the Shungite Elite Necklace is £35 with a rough natural 2cm piece on a 20 inch sterling silver chain. The Shungite Pendulum Necklace is £35, with a 3cm faceted point that can be worn on its chain or held between the fingers as a pendulum. Both are handmade by me in Luton, and both carry my repaired free, for life promise.

Free UK shipping on orders over £50. Everything is sent from Luton, and collection is available if you are local.