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A number of individual gemstones are famous in their own right, either because of their size and beauty or because of the people who owned or wore them.
| | This article needs additional citations for verification .(March 2017) |
A number of individual gemstones are famous in their own right, either because of their size and beauty or because of the people who owned or wore them.
Emerald is a gemstone and a variety of the mineral beryl (Be3Al2(SiO3)6) colored green by trace amounts of chromium or sometimes vanadium. Beryl has a hardness of 7.5–8 on the Mohs scale. Most emeralds have many inclusions, so their toughness (resistance to breakage) is classified as generally poor. Emerald is a cyclosilicate.
A gemstone is a piece of mineral crystal which, when cut or polished, is used to make jewelry or other adornments. Certain rocks and occasionally organic materials that are not minerals may also be used for jewelry and are therefore often considered to be gemstones as well. Most gemstones are hard, but some softer minerals such as brazilianite may be used in jewelry because of their color or luster or other physical properties that have aesthetic value. However, generally speaking, soft minerals are not typically used as gemstones by virtue of their brittleness and lack of durability.
Sapphire is a precious gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum, consisting of aluminium oxide (α-Al2O3) with trace amounts of elements such as iron, titanium, cobalt, lead, chromium, vanadium, magnesium, boron, and silicon. The name sapphire is derived from the Latin word sapphirus, itself from the Greek word sappheiros (σάπφειρος), which referred to lapis lazuli. It is typically blue, but natural "fancy" sapphires also occur in yellow, purple, orange, and green colors; "parti sapphires" show two or more colors. Red corundum stones also occur, but are called rubies rather than sapphires. Pink-colored corundum may be classified either as ruby or sapphire depending on the locale. Commonly, natural sapphires are cut and polished into gemstones and worn in jewelry. They also may be created synthetically in laboratories for industrial or decorative purposes in large crystal boules. Because of the remarkable hardness of sapphires – 9 on the Mohs scale (the third-hardest mineral, after diamond at 10 and moissanite at 9.5) – sapphires are also used in some non-ornamental applications, such as infrared optical components, high-durability windows, wristwatch crystals and movement bearings, and very thin electronic wafers, which are used as the insulating substrates of special-purpose solid-state electronics such as integrated circuits and GaN-based blue LEDs. Sapphire is the birthstone for September and the gem of the 45th anniversary. A sapphire jubilee occurs after 65 years.
Ruby is a pinkish red to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum. Ruby is one of the most popular traditional jewelry gems and is very durable. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called sapphires. Ruby is one of the traditional cardinal gems, alongside amethyst, sapphire, emerald, and diamond. The word ruby comes from ruber, Latin for red. The color of a ruby is due to the element chromium.
Lustre or luster is the way light interacts with the surface of a crystal, rock, or mineral. The word traces its origins back to the Latin lux, meaning "light", and generally implies radiance, gloss, or brilliance.
In mineralogy, an inclusion is any material trapped inside a mineral during its formation. In gemology, it is an object enclosed within a gemstone or reaching its surface from the interior. According to James Hutton's law of inclusions, fragments included in a host rock are older than the host rock itself.
The French Crown Jewels and Regalia comprise the crowns, orb, sceptres, diadems and jewels that were symbols of Royal or Imperial power between 752 and 1870. These were worn by many Kings and Queens of France as well as Emperor Napoleon. The set was finally broken up, with most of it sold off in 1885 by the Third Republic. The surviving French Crown Jewels, principally a set of historic crowns, diadems and parures, are mainly on display in the Galerie d'Apollon of the Louvre, France's premier museum and former royal palace, together with the Regent Diamond, the Sancy Diamond and the 105-carat (21.0 g) Côte-de-Bretagne red spinel, carved into the form of a dragon. In addition, some gemstones and jewels are on display in the Treasury vault of the Mineralogy gallery in the National Museum of Natural History.
Navaratna is a Sanskrit compound word meaning "nine gems" or "ratnas". Jewellery created in this style has important cultural significance in many southern, and south-eastern Asian cultures as a symbol of wealth, and status, and is claimed to yield talismanic benefits towards health and well-being. The setting of the stones is believed to hold mystical powers tied to the astrology and mythology of Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism. The historic origin of the navaratna is tied to the astrological concept of "Navagrahas", or "nine celestial gods" (planets).
A birthstone is a gemstone that represents a person's birth period, usually the month or zodiac sign. Birthstones are often worn as jewelry or a pendant necklace.
Hiddenite, North Carolina, United States, is a centre for the mining of gemstones. Three larger mines found there are Adams Mine, NAEM and the Emerald Hollow Mine. They are collectively known as the Hiddenite Gem Mines.
The Chalmer's Topaz is a topaz gem weighing 5,899.5-carats located in Chicago, Illinois' Grainger Hall of Gems, in the Field Museum of Natural History. It was named for former Field Museum trustee William J. Chalmers and his wife Joan Chalmers, who established a fund used to purchase gemstones for the Field Museum collections. The Chalmers Topaz is one of the largest cut topaz gems in the world.
There are many types of gemstones of Pakistan. They can be found among the nation's three mountain ranges - the Hindu Kush, the Himalayas, and the Karakoram - in the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan, Balochistan, and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. The gemstone industry in Pakistan has the city of Peshawar as its hub, and there are many companies working in it.
The Star of Adam is an oval-shaped blue star sapphire, currently the largest star sapphire in the world. It weighs 1,404.49 carats. Prior to its discovery in 2015, the Black Star of Queensland, weighing 733 carats (146.6 g), was the largest star sapphire gem in the world.
The Allison and Roberto Mignone Halls of Gems and Minerals are a series of exhibition halls at the American Museum of Natural History on the Upper West Side in Manhattan, New York City. The halls opened on June 12, 2021, as a complete redesign of their predecessors, the Harry Frank Guggenheim Hall of Gems and Minerals and Morgan Memorial Hall of Gems. The halls feature thousands of rare gems, mineral specimens and pieces of jewelry.
Aquamarine is a pale-blue to light-green variety of the beryl family, with its name relating to water and sea. The color of aquamarine can be changed by heat, with a goal to enhance its physical appearance. It is the birth stone of March.
FURA Gems is a private global mining company that produces colored gemstones: emeralds, rubies, and sapphires. Founded in 2017 FURA has its headquarters in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and operates mining subsidiaries in Colombia, Mozambique, and Australia. In 2021, the company managed approximately six million carats of Mozambican rubies and 300,000 carats of Colombian emeralds. In 2022, FURA Gems unveiled the world's largest gem-quality ruby ever mined, which was sold by Sotheby's for $34.8 million in 2023.
Gemmological classifications by E. Ya. Kievlenko (1980), updated | |||||||||
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