Stoned: Jewellery, Obsession, and How Need Shapes the World

As entertaining as it’s incisive, Stoned is a raucous journey by way of the historical past of human need for what’s uncommon, and subsequently valuable.

What makes a stone a jewel? What makes a jewel priceless? And why will we covet lovely issues? On this sensible account of how eight jewels formed the course of historical past, jeweler and scientist Aja Raden tells an unique and infrequently startling story about our unshakeable habit to magnificence and the darker facet of human need.

What strikes the world is what strikes every of us: need. Jewellery—which has lengthy served as a stand-in for wealth and energy, glamor and success—has birthed cultural actions, launched political dynasties, and began wars. Masterfully weaving collectively pop science and historical past, Stoned breaks historical past into three classes—Need, Take, and Have—and explains what the diamond in your finger has to do with the GI Invoice, why green-tinted jewellery has been exalted by so many cultures, why the glass beads that purchased Manhattan for the Dutch have been initially thought-about a good commerce, and the way the French Revolution began over a coveted necklace.

Studded with energetic personalities and engaging particulars, Stoned tells the outstanding story of our abiding need for the uncommon and extraordinary.