Volcanic glass, cooled too fast to crystallise. It breaks to an edge sharper than steel.
The aesthetic
Obsidian is not a mineral at all but a natural glass, lava cooled so quickly that nothing had time to crystallise. It breaks along smooth curved surfaces to an edge finer than a surgical blade, which is why it was worked into tools long before metal. Usually jet black, it also occurs with a gold or rainbow sheen from microscopic bubbles, in mahogany and snowflake patterns, and rarely in a translucent smoky brown.
The dynamic
Obsidian is strongly associated with protection and with unflinching self-examination, described in most traditions as a mirror stone that shows what is actually there.
Some variations
- snowflake obsidian
- rainbow obsidian
- mahogany obsidian
- apache tears
- sheen obsidian