Jewellery made to symbolise or commemorate a person or event rather than simply to adorn is of historical interest and is often comparatively cheap.
Most early jewellery - and many pieces produced right up to the 20th century — served more than merely decorative purposes, embodying some theme, device or message in its design. Such jewellery [...]
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Many people jump into the process of making jewelry and take shortcuts that only hurt them in the long run. Maybe they buy tools and supplies that don’t give them the results they’re looking for. Or they don’t treat their new tools right. Or perhaps they’re worried that their great new “original” design will make [...]
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Twenty-four goldsmiths worked continuously for six years to make the finely chiselled and richly ornamented Crown of the Andes from one massive gold nugget. This splendid jewel is adorned with 453 emeralds of a total weight of 1,521 carats. Today, each carat attains a valuation price of $3,000. After a long odyssey this treasure, estimated [...]
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The collective name garnet embraces a large mineral group whose members each have their own individual names corresponding to their appearance. This family provides a good example of the fact that though the structure of a mineral determines its external form (garnets crystallize throughout in the cubic system), it is the chemical composition which is [...]
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A few years ago a hitherto unknown and unusually interesting occurrence was discovered in Tanzania supplying green, so-called prase, opal, which owes its color to a small nickel content derived from weathered serpentine. Since the opal here, as in all the other localities, crops out relatively near the earth’s surface in fairly easily workable rocks, [...]
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The beguiling luster of this attractive gemstone—shining like damp moss in autumn sunshine—earned peridot the sobriquet of “green gold.” In earlier times it was readily linked with the sun, of whose bright rays it was said to be the keeper and therefore alleged to be a shield against the threat of eclipse and blindness of [...]
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As a token of gratitude for the assistance in arms and the victory won near Najera (i 367), he gave the precious stone to the Black Prince. After the Prince’s death the coveted gem was inherited by the tragic Richard II, and doubtless fell into Bolingbroke’s possession when he ascended the throne as Henry IV: [...]
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In her magic garden of crystal blossoms deep in the earth, the Earth Goddess cherished a treasure of choicest excellence, to which she gave an abundance of melting colors, as well as high refraction (1.72) and vivid fire (0.02 1), notable hardness (8) and complete absence of cleavage. From the sum of this generous endowment [...]
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ALL stages of imaginable color possibilities are captured by this gemstone which, in addition to white and black, embraces every hue to be found in the spectrum, not only in pure tones but in all the fine nuances of innumerable shades, transitions, and mixtures. Should a collector set himself the task of amassing all the [...]
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Nature has conferred on zircon several quite outstanding optical properties which furnish brilliant-cut specimens with a particularly striking appearance. High adamantine luster and very vivid fire elevate zircon into the immediate proximity of diamond. Its specific gravity is unequalled by any other transparent gemstone. Its high refractive index of 1.95 and powerful color-dispersive ability of [...]
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