Orthoceras pendant

A simple pendant I made from a fossil I came across during our lapidary club's annual exhibition. I was attracted to it because of its shape and also the fact that it contains the fossilised remains of a sea creature, the straight elongated shape you see is the shell it used to live in. Around 400 million years ago it was a mollusk living in the Paleozoic seas, it resembles a squid living in an long, conical shell that resembles a unicorn horn. In fact, it's name means straight horn.
Here are some of the finest depictions the internet has to offer, [link] and [link]

In this particular fossil, the black line you see running down the shell is the siphuncle, a sort of tube that allows the orthoceras to store water and shoot it out to propel itself forward. (like an underwater jetpack) The siphuncle also enables the creature to control its buoyancy by squeezing out water and leaving air instead. (like a submarine, up or down) The soft-bodied creature will normally occupy the open ended chamber at the large end of the shell. The shell grows with it, so everytime it grows bigger it simply seals off the smaller space it used to occupy. (thats what the little curved lines are)

I'm not usually one to collect fossils, but I liked this particular one when I saw it, part of the reason was because it looked masculine, quite at odds with my usual choices. I wanted to try and make a fairly simple pendant that a man could wear without feeling gaudy, even for someone who wouldn't normally wear jewelry. Something that wouldn't detract from the fossil's charm. What's it charm? It echos of a creature which lived long ago, when it died it left its shell on the ocean floor until the build up of sediments over the years preserved and hardened it for someone to find. For people who like earth sciences, its interesting from a geological point of view, for people who are poetic,its continued existence in a different form might suggest some symbolic meaning to them.
What would you think if a girl gave this to you?

I decided to try match the monochromatic theme of the fossil with black leather and silver. I added a tiny blue sapphire in the end cos I couldn't resist adding color for accent, blue for the deep blue sea where its species once lived and thrived.