Sar-e Sang

Sar-e Sang lies high in the Hindu Kush above the Kokcha valley, amid the celebrated lapis lazuli mines of Badakhshan. The deep blue stone, often flecked with golden pyrite and white calcite, has been extracted here since antiquity and carried far beyond the mountains. Before explosives were used, miners heated the rock with fires and cracked it by throwing cold water over it.

In the thirteenth century Marco Polo described a mountain in Badakhshan where exceptionally fine blue stone was found, though he did not visit the mines himself. Ground lapis supplied the costly pigment known as ultramarine, prized by painters as well as by makers of ornaments and precious objects. The difficult paths from the mines into the Kokcha valley joined the stone to trading networks extending across Asia and beyond.