A ring set with a carbuncle possessed the opposite property, of making one visible in pitch dark. Thus, in Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus when Martius looks into the deep pit and cries that Bassianus is lying there, his comrades ask how he can see, and he replies:
Upon his bloody finger he doth wear
A precious ring that lightens all the hole,
Which like a taper in some monument
Doth shine upon the dead man’s earthy cheeks
And shows the rugged entrails of the pit.
Religious Rings
The early magician or medicine man, when he became the priest, did not relinquish his ring. As far back as we find traces of worship, we find religious uses of the ring. Their pious symbolism was perhaps most fully detailed by Pope Innocent III, when on May 29, 1205 he sent to King John of England four golden rings each set with a colored stone, and explained their symbolism in this way: The endless shape of the ring reminds us of eternity, and that we are all journeyers through time to eternity. The number of rings equals the four virtues that comprise constancy of mind: justice, fortitude, prudence, and temperance. The metal signifies wisdom from on high, which is as gold purified by fire. The four stones are an emerald, green emblem of faith; a sapphire, blue emblem of hope; a garnet, red emblem of charity; and a topaz, bright emblem of good works. The four rings, the four stones, the metal, and the shape, make ten aspects: ten is the perfect number, being the unity of nature plus the trinity of God multiplied and fructified by itself.
The religious symbolism of rings has not lapsed. Even today the Pope wears the traditional annulus piscatoris, the Fisherman’s Ring, which shows St. Peter in a boat, casting a net to haul in the faithful from the waters of the world. Clerics of various ranks and orders wear special rings. Nuns wear a ring to signify their symbolic marriage to Jesus.