The Wilde AltarA developing queer pagan library
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Gay-led and LGBTQ+ affirming. Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, nonbinary, intersex, asexual, questioning people, and respectful allies are welcome. No role here is assigned by anatomy or orientation.

Crystal cabinet

Howlite

Howlite, a calcium borosilicate hydroxide, naturally white to gray.

Undyed howlite is opaque white, cream, or pale gray with a fine charcoal or brown web of veins, and it takes a matte to waxy polish. It looks a little like porcelain or a pale cauliflower stone. Dyed, it becomes a loud blue or green that pools in the veins and sometimes rubs onto skin; a sky blue with brown rock matrix is more likely real turquoise or a different imitation; howlite's matrix is the gray web, not ironstone.

What it actually is

Material identity
Name used hereHowlite
Mineral or materialHowlite, a calcium borosilicate hydroxide, naturally white to gray.
HardnessAbout Mohs 3.5. Soft, porous, and easy to dye for exactly that reason.
How it formsHowlite forms in borate-rich evaporite deposits, a secondary calcium borosilicate, which is why the classic localities are dry places such as California and, historically, Nova Scotia, where Henry How described it in the nineteenth century. The veins are geological; the blue, in most jewelry, is a later bath.

Trade names and mix-ups

Natural howlite is white or gray with dark veins, and its main fame in bead shops is as a dye sponge: turquoise-colored howlite is still howlite, and blue howlite sold as lapis is the same trick. Magnesite is a different white mineral dyed for the same reasons. If the tag says turquoise and the price says craft store, look for howlite's gray web under a thin patch of dye, and then believe the web.

Care

Keep dyed howlite out of water or it will bleed onto hands, grout, and conscience. Even undyed howlite is soft: no salt storage, no pocket of keys, no ultrasonic, no acid. A dry cloth only is the safest rule for any piece that might be dyed. Sun can fade dye and does nothing useful for the mineral. Do not scrub the veins; they are not dirt. Perfume stains porous stone.

Provenance

Howlite is common, and the ethical issue is almost entirely fraud: a white borate mineral dyed to borrow the prestige of turquoise, including prestige that belongs to Indigenous jewelry traditions and not to a craft-store bead. Sell it and buy it as howlite, pay for turquoise when you mean turquoise, and do not pass dyed beads on as natural stone to someone who trusts you.

Symbolism

  • the white before the dye
  • plain speech
  • veins like a map
  • refusing a costume

Folklore, only where it exists

Howlite was named in the nineteenth century for the Canadian chemist Henry How, from material in Nova Scotia. It has no ancient magical record. Whatever calming or patience language a shop attaches was attached after the fact, often to stones whose real job was to imitate turquoise cheaply. The interesting story is the dye bath. The Wilde Altar keeps an undyed piece, if it keeps one, as a reminder that a costume is a choice. You may also keep a dyed bead if you label it dyed, because the lesson is sharper when the blue is still on it and the label refuses to lie. There is no need to invent a Victorian witch cult of howlite to justify owning a white rock. Porosity and honesty are enough.

Cautions

An original practice

The Undyed White

  • A piece of howlite, undyed if possible, dyed only if labeled
  • A blue thread, a blue scrap of paper, or a turquoise bead you have already identified honestly
  • A label
  • A pen
  1. 1Put the howlite on the table. If it is dyed, write dyed howlite, not turquoise on the label before you do anything prettier.
  2. 2Lay the blue thread beside it, not on a wet sponge. Write one sentence: this mineral is white or gray when no one has dyed it.
  3. 3Write a second sentence about your own week: one place you exaggerated, and the plainer version. The plainer version should still be kind enough to say to a friend, a partner, or yourself.
  4. 4Read the plainer version aloud. Attach the label to the howlite's box.
  5. 5Put the blue thread back in the sewing kit. The howlite does not get to keep a costume it did not grow.
White first, then any blue a person added. I can take the extra adjective off. A costume is not a birthplace.

Store the stone dry, label visible. If it is dyed, do not rinse it to finish the practice or you will finish the dye instead.

A practical action. Correct the exaggeration in the place it lives: the listing, the story, the apology, the box you were about to gift.

Substitutions

  • A lump of white chalk labeled chalk, not soaked and not eaten
  • A plain white paper stone you cut out and refuse to color

Beginner questions

  • Is blue howlite turquoise? No. It is dyed howlite. Turquoise is a copper aluminum phosphate. The dye is a costume.
  • Does howlite have ancient calming powers? No. It was described in the nineteenth century and sold hard in the bead trade after that. Any calming claim is modern and optional as metaphor only.
  • Can I soak dyed howlite to release the color into bath water for a ritual? No. That is a dye bath and a mess, not an elixir this cabinet allows. Do not drink it, do not bathe in it.
AmberNot a mineral and not a crystal. Amber is fossilized tree resin. Copal is younger, less polymerized resin and is often sold as if it were amber.OpalOpal, hydrated silica, a mineraloid rather than a crystalline mineral. Precious opal shows play-of-color; common opal does not.PeridotOlivine, specifically a magnesium-iron silicate in the forsterite to fayalite series, gem-quality pieces being toward the magnesium-rich, iron-bearing forsterite end.