Clear Quartz

Clear quartz is the pure, colourless kind of quartz, the hard mineral of silicon dioxide that Wikipedia ranks second in abundance in the Earth's lithosphere, behind only the feldspar group. It forms transparent or translucent crystals, often long and pointed, and has traditionally been called rock crystal. The Greeks named it krustallos, from their word for icy cold, and Pliny believed it was ice frozen solid over long ages; Cunningham likewise records that the ancients took it for solid water, and that it was used to bring rain in parts of the Pacific. Wikipedia notes that quartz turns up in European passage tombs such as Newgrange, and that it is the material most often identified as maban, a mystical substance in Aboriginal Australian mythology. Cunningham assigns it to the Sun and Moon and to fire and water, and counts protection, healing and psychic power among its virtues. He describes points worn or carried to heighten psychic awareness, a crystal under the pillow for dreams and peaceful rest, spheres and pendulums used for scrying and divination, and crystals laid out to mark the magic circle. Hall calls quartz a master healer and an amplifier of energy, and associates it with cleansing, meditation, psychic ability and memory. Both writers handle its coloured kinds, such as rose and smoky quartz, on their own.