Michelangelo used lapis lazuli powder for the blue colors in his frescoes for the Sistine Chapel

“In ancient Sumer,” writes Scott Cunningham in his Encyclopedia of Crystal, Gem, and Metal Magic, “lapis lazuli has timeless associations” with royalty and deities. 

The stone was said to contain “the soul of the deity, who would ‘rejoice in its owner.’” 

In ancient Egypt, pharaohs favored lapis lazuli, and judges wore emblems of Maat, the goddess of truth, made from the stone.

https://www.gemsociety.org/article/history-legend-lapis-lazuli-gems-yore/