I’d had these two pendants for a while, having bought them in a charity shop for £1.50 each. The big one is unsigned but the smaller enhancer pendant (bottom pic) is stamped for sterling silver and has a maker’s mark – WK for Whitney Kelly.

I was a bit mystified as to the identity of the rather attractive green stone. I managed to find some pics online of something called green zebra jasper, which I learned consisted of green serpentine interspersed with layers of chrysotile. These stones I saw online looked identical to the stones on my pendants. Bingo, I thought. The word “chrysotile” did sound vaguely familiar but having found a name for the stone, I pressed ahead and listed one of them on Etsy with a title that started “Green zebra jasper pendant chrysotile”.

I was taken aback when Etsy took down my listing a day or so later, informing me that chrysotile was a banned substance. So I looked it up and lo and behold, it turns out that chrysotile is a type of asbestos that can cause asbestosis (inflammation and scarring of the lungs), as well as lung cancer.

I honestly don’t know if these pendants pose a real threat to human life or health, but I’m not going to list them anywhere else. However, Etsy does have a ton of listings for green zebra jasper gemstones and beads. Either these sellers know about the chrysotile connection and have omitted the keyword from their titles to avoid getting their listings taken down, or they’re just totally unaware. It’s an interesting one – I would love to know more about green zebra jasper and just how safe (or unsafe) it is.