page_title: Vivianite
section_title: Pigment
hierarchical_section_title: Vivianite / Pigment
context_page_description: Vivianite is a hydrated iron phosphate mineral found in a number of geological environments. Small amounts of manganese Mn²⁺, magnesium Mg and calcium Ca may substitute for iron Fe²⁺ in the structure. Pure vivianite is colorless, but the mineral oxidizes very easily, changing the color, and it is usually found as deep blue to deep bluish green prismatic to flattened crystals.
  Vivianite crystals are often found inside fossil shells, such as those of bivalves and gastropods, or attached to fossil bone.
  It was named by Abraham Gottlob Werner in 1817, the year of his death, after either John Henry Vivian, a Welsh-Cornish politician, mine owner and mineralogist living in Truro, Cornwall, England, or after Jeffrey G. Vivian, an English mineralogist. Vivianite was discovered at Wheal Kind, in St Agnes, Cornwall.
context_section_description: Vivianite was known as a pigment since Roman times but its use in oil painting was rather limited. It has been found in Vermeer's The Procuress in the blue-grey parts of the carpet in the foreground.
caption: Johannes Vermeer, The Procuress, 1656
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.6.9", "Image DateTime": "2010:07:07 17:08:52", "Image ExifOffset": "146", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "282", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8163", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2024", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2254"}