Let's talk about the Thunder Stone!

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“A peculiar stone that can make certain species of Pokémon evolve. It has a distinct thunderbolt pattern.”

The Thunder Stone is one of the "classic" evolution stones, known to science for a long time and linked to the electric element, thanks to which it's capable of evolving Pokémon from eight different evolutionary lines.

If it's true that all evolutionary stones originate from common stones infused with evolutionary energy, resulting in different properties depending on the original stone, what might our proto-Thunderstone be? To understand this, we have several possibilities, and a simple, apparent factor will guide us as to which option is plausible and which to discard: let's keep in mind its appearance. A greenish stone, almost always translucent, with the pale shape of a bright flash at its center.

Well, stones and thunders have already been widely associated with each other in the past, in more than one occasion!

The fulgurite comes to mind, for example, an extraordinary rock that is also known as fossilized lightning. Fulgurites are formed when lightning or a similar electrical discharge strikes a terrain that it can pass through, such as silica sand: the release of that energy melts or alters the soil, transforming it into fulgurite.

However, as wonderful as it is to think that our Thunder Stone could have literally been created by lightning, its appearance and properties are completely off the mark. For starters, fulgurites don't have a specific chemical composition, because they are the result of the transformation of whatever soil was struck by lightning.

They form on the ground with ramifications similar to Lichtenberg figures (how beautiful!), but while we could try to recreate them to our heart's content with a little chemistry knowledge and an Electric-type Pokémon at our side, fulgurites are still rare due to their fragility: grayish, tubular, hollow glassy masses, ready to crumble at the first clumsy grip. It doesn't really look like they could be our proto-Thunderstone.

But folklore and history still have so many ideas for us!

For example, the Galarians called several fossils derived from ancestors of the Inkay and Pincurchin lines, and sometimes from Omanytes, "thunderstones," because they were thought to have fallen from the sky during storms. Fascinating! But probably not the candidate we're looking for, as Pokémon fossils are a separate and well-studied phenomenon (and closer to our research on leaf stones, if anything!).

Something closer? Ancient Unovan legends describe peculiar spherical rock formations known as "thundereggs," nodular formations that, when opened, reveal a mineral center (usually chalcedony) distinct from the outer layers of volcanic ash. These were said to be the eggs of Zapdos, who, according to legend, was a horrible parent because it would hurl them around and at others.

It does look a bit more like our ideal proto-Thunderstone, with a connection to a legendary Electric-type Pokémon and a heart (perhaps what will become the lightning symbol on the stone's surface?) different from the external layers. Is there anything closer than that?

Well, apparently, yes!

There's a mineral that even nowadays the friends in Kanto, Johto, and Hoenn call "electric stone", which can be green, clear, with a connection to electricty and what seems to actually be the image of a bolt on its surface. What we're talking about is tourmaline!

In Kantonian, tourmaline is called 電気石, denkiishi, a word composed of the three kanji for electricity, spirit or energy, and stone. Its name derives from its marked tendency to react to electricity, being both pyroelectric and piezoelectric: in short, it is a naturally polarized crystal capable of generating an electrical voltage when heated or cooled, and of accumulating an electric charge when subjected to mechanical stress (such as compression).

Tourmalines are actually a group of stones, and among the minerals in this group, elbaite stands out, and even more so its completely green variety, called verdelite. Here it is, our green stone, translucent and connected to electricity! As if that weren't enough, verdelite can exhibit chatoyancy, an optical phenomenon in which a luminous band similar to a Persian's pupil appears on the surface and seems to glide across it depending on the position of the light or the observer.

Probably not all tourmalines had to present chatoyancy to become Thunder Stones, but it is not impossible that the very process of becoming an evolution stone altered their structure, giving this effect to the mutated ones!

It looks like our journey to find the proto-Thunderstone might end here. And if verdelite is indeed the stone we seek, it would mean our Thunder Stone has always been a little magical and a little electric... even before giving our Eelektrik a glow-up.

Fun facts:

• Thunder Stone appears to have no effect on Pokémon with the Gigantamax Factor.

• Some anecdotes told by Kanto trainers describe evolving Pokémon that require a Thunder Stone simply by placing them next to a Growlithe "when they seemed ready." This would not have worked with its evolved form, Arcanine, but the Puppy Pokémon would have worked wonders for obtaining a Raichu or a Jolteon. Although extensively described back then, the phenomenon has been completely impossible to replicate in recent times and appears to have been reported in no other region. It has been speculated that ancient Growlithes were able to generate heat through a particularly active electromagnetic field to which certain Pokémon were sensitive, mistaking the stimulation for the electrical energy in a stone rather than the elemental energy of a Fire-type Pokémon. Other hypotheses suggest the existence of an Electric-type variant or close relative of Growlithe, perhaps the inspiration for the raijū myth. Others have advanced the idea that the unique circumstances of the experiment could simply indicate a debunked belief that was common among the locals rather than a real phenomenon.
   
• Thunderstones is also the name given to prehistoric artifacts created by humans from flint or other stones, known as ceraunia. Many cultures that discovered them considered them lucky objects linked to their thunder and storm deities, probably always with the idea that they had "rained from the sky" or appeared where the ground had been struck by lightning.

 

Read about the other evolution stones HERE! 

 

Prof.ssa Roberta Camara

Università degli Studi di Panormus 

 

 🌵🎨 All the drawings in this page (and probably of all the others too, unless otherwise specified) were made by our artists, Furiarossa e Mimma. The artwork depicting the Thunder Stone is a sprite of the Pokémon Company.🌵🎨.