Hematite, the Bleeding Stone

Hematite is iron oxide, the principal ore of iron, and its name records its most striking property: from Greek haima, blood, because however dark and metallic the polished surface, hematite always leaves a red-brown streak when drawn across unglazed porcelain, and its powder is red. That red powder is one of the oldest pigments known, the red ochre found in Palaeolithic burials and cave art, so hematite has a ritual association with blood and with the dead that reaches back tens of thousands of years.

Polished into beads and intaglios it was popular in the Roman world and again in Victorian mourning jewellery. Modern crystal practice treats it as a grounding and protective stone; note that much bright, strongly magnetic hematite sold today is hematine, a synthetic ceramic, since natural hematite is at most weakly magnetic. No therapeutic property should be inferred from the iron content.