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Educate Yourself...
We have tried to make a comprehension of the most common jewelry terms used while describing jewelry on our website. We think that the more you know the more you will be confident on selecting the right jewelry, for an educated customer is the one who recognizes the deals that we offer. If you have any questions feel free to contact us and we would be glad to assist you.
Abalone: A univalve mollusk known for its iridescent natural pearls.
Akoya: A pearl produced by the Japanese "Akoya" oyster..
Alexandrite: Named after Czar Alexander II, very desirable, green in daylight, red in artificial light.
Amethyst: A purple or violet form of transparent quartz used as a gemstone.
Aquamarine: Latin for Water of the Sea, Beryl group.
Australian Opal: Australian opal is classified into five main types: black opal, light opal, crystal opal, boulder opal, and common opal.
Baroque: A pearl with an irregular shape.
Beryl: aluminum beryllium silicate, Group of minerals that includes; Emerald, and Aquamarine.
Black Opal: A dark colored opal with internal reflections of green or red.
Box chain: A chain in which the link is wide and square and resembles a box. Can be made of gold, silver, platinum or other non precious metals.
Brilliance: Relating to, or being a hue that has a strong combination of lightness and strong saturation.
Brilliant-full Cut: This cut has at least 32 facets plus the table on the upper part, and 24 facets on the lower part. Usually refereed to as a brilliant cut when talking about diamonds.
Cabochon: Gem which is cut and polished to have a dome shaped upper surface. Such stones are said to be en cabochon.
Carat: Unit of weight for gems. A carat is 1/5th of a gram.
Ceylon Cut: This has numerous facets and is cut to get maximum weight thus it is not always symmetrical.
Chrysoberyl: beryllium aluminium oxide, Group of minerals including Alexandrite and Chrysoberyl cat's eye.
Citrine: A pale yellow variety crystalline quartz resembling topaz.
Clarity: Clearness of appearance.
Cleanliness: The absence of blemishes (spots, pimples, cracks) or discoloration on the pearl's surface.
Cleavage: The breaking of stones along lines of weakness related to the stones internal atomic structure.
Clouds: A dark region or blemish on a polished stone.
Crown: The top part of a cut stone, above the girdle.
Crystals: A mineral, especially a transparent form of quartz, having a crystalline form of structure, often characterized by external planar faces.
Cultivated Pearl: Another term used to indicate "cultured pearl".
Cut: A term used to describe how a stone is faceted or shaped. The most popular shapes are Round brilliant, Marquise, Pear, Emerald, Princess and Oval.
Diamond: Crystallized Carbon. Probably the most recognized Gemstone in the world.
Dispersion: The splitting of white light into its constituent spectral colors, the rainbow colors, when it passes through inclined surfaces, such as those on a prism or faceted gem. Dispersion in gemstones is called fire.
Double Refraction: The phenomenon in which each ray of light is split in tow as it enters a no cubic mineral. Each ray travels at different speeds and has its own refractive index.
Doublet: Composite stone made of two pieces cemented or glued together.
E. G. L. - European Gemological Laboratory: EGL is one of the world's premier independent gemological laboratories. For over 25 years it has offered the fine jewelry trade and consumers accurate, reliable gemstone identification and professional certification to validate their gemstone purchases.
Eight Cut: This has 8 facets on the upper and lower parts as well, plus the table. It is used for small stones.
Emerald: Greek Smaragdos (Green Stone), Beryl group.
Emerald Cut: Step cut with an octagon shape, especially used with emeralds
Faces: Flat surfaces that make up the external shape of a crystal.
Facet: Surface of a cut and polished gem.
Fancy Cut: Name applied to a gemstone when given an unconventional shape when faceted.
Feathers: A feather-shaped flaw, as in a precious stone.
Fire: See dispersion
Fluorescence: Normally invisible wavelengths of light that become "visible" when exposed to ultraviolet radiation. Gems or pearls that exhibit color under ultraviolet light, color not normally seen in normal light, are exhibiting "fluorescence".
Fracture: Chipping or breaking of a stone in a way unrelated to its internal atomic structure. Because of this fractured surfaces are often uneven.
Freshwater Pearl: Pearls produced by freshwater mollusks.
Garnet: Group of differently colored minerals with similar chemical composition. Usually a red orangish tone when found in jewelry.
Gemstone: A decorative material, usually a mineral, prized for some or all of the qualities of beauty, durability, and rarity.
G. I. A. - Gemological Institute of America: Established in 1931, GIA is the world’s largest and most respected nonprofit institute of gemological research and learning. Conceived 75 years ago in the august tradition of Europe’s most venerated institutes, GIA discovers (through GIA Research), imparts (through GIA Education), and applies (through the GIA Gem Laboratory and GIA Gem Instruments) gemological knowledge to ensure the public trust in gems and jewelry.
Girdle: The band around the widest part of a cut stone, where the crown meets the pavilion.
Gold: A soft yellow corrosion resistant element, the most malleable and ductile metal, occurring in veins and alluvial deposits and recovered by mining or by panning or sluicing.
Gold-lip Oyster: A large oyster used in some countries to produce South Sea cultured pearls. It is called a "yellow" or "gold" lip oyster because it produces yellowish nacre and the pearls tend to range in color from off-white to deep gold.
Grain: The standard unit of weight once used for natural pearls. Four grains are equal to one carat.
Half-drilled: Pearls which have only been partly drilled, as for rings or earrings.
Hardness: See Mohs Scale of Hardness
Heat Treatment: The application of heat to a gem with the purpose of enhancing the gems colour and or clarity.
I. G. I. - International Gemological Institute: The International Gemological Institute (IGI) is the largest independent gem grading and appraisal institute in the world, renowned for their expertise and extensive experience in serving the diamond and jewelry industry for over 25 years.
Imitation Gemstone: Material that has the outward appearance of the gem it is intended to imitate, but which has different physical properties.
Inclusions: Markings or foreign bodies found within the stone.
Iolite: A silicate of alumina, iron, and magnesia having a bright blue color and vitreous luster.
Jewelry Steamer: Used to clean jewelry with steam.
Lapidary: A craftsperson who cuts and polishes gemstones.
Luster: A) Shine or "look" of a gemstone due to reflection of light off the surface. B) The unique, internally emanating glow that distinguishes pearls from all other gems.
Mabe Pearl: An assembled pearl created by filling a hollow blister and then applying a mother-of-pearl back to complete the pearl.
Mohs Scale of Hardness: The measure of a mineral's hardness in relation to other minerals, based on it's ability to resist scratching.
Morganite: Soft Pink to Violet in color, Beryl group.
Multicolored: Used to describe a single crystal made of different colored parts.
Opal: A mineral, an amorphous form of silica, SiO2 with some water of hydration, found in many varieties and colors, including a form that is milky white.
Opalescence: Milky blue form of iridescence.
Opaque: Not transparent or translucent; impenetrable to light; not allowing light to pass through.
Oriental Pearl: A natural pearl.
P. Margaritifera: A pearl-producing oyster with black, white, or golden colored "lips". The black variety is used to create Tahitian black pearls.
Pavilion: A lower surface of a brilliant-cut gem slanting outward from the culet to the girdle.
Pearl: A smooth, rounded bead formed within the shells of certain mollusks and composed of the mineral aragonite or calcite in a matrix, deposited in concentric layers as a protective coating around an irritating foreign object: valued as a gem when lustrous and finely colored.
Peridot: A yellowish-green variety of olivine used as a gem.
Platinum: A heavy precious metallic element; grey-white and resistant to corroding; occurs in some nick and copper ores and is also found native in some deposits.
Pleochroic: Term used to describe a gem that appears two or more different colors or shades when viewed from different directions.
Polishing Cloth: cloth used to clean and polish jewelry safely.
Prong: Jewelry. a tapering metal projection, usually heavier than a claw, rising from the base of a jewelry setting and used to hold a stone in position as needed.
Quartz: A very hard mineral composed of silica, found worldwide in many different types of rocks, including sandstone and granite.
Refraction: Bending of light as it passes from air into a different medium.
Refractive Index: Measures the slowing down and bending of light rays as they enter a gemstone. Maybe used to identify gem species.
Rhodolite: A rose-red or pink variety of garnet, a silicate mineral used as a gem.
Rough: Term used to describe a rock or crystal still in its natural state, before faceting or polishing.
Rose Cut: A facet cut without table or pavilion. Does not produce much brilliance.
Ruby: Name in Latin, Rubeus (Red), Corundum group, aluminum oxide.
Sapphire: Name in Greek, (Blue), Corundum group, aluminum oxide.
Species: Used in gemology to refer to individual gems that has distinct characteristics which may be defined and verified.
Spinel: magnesium aluminium oxide, may mean "spark" in Greek.
Step Cut: Cut shaped by a rectangular table facet and girdle, with rectangular facets parallel to these.
Sterling Silver: An alloy of 92.5% silver and copper or another material.
Stone: Term used for any gemstone.
Symmetry, Axis Of: Imaginary line through a crystal. If the crystal were rotated about its axis it would present an identical aspect tow or more times in a rotation of 360 degrees.
Synthetic Gemstone: A laboratory-made stone whose chemical composition and optical properties are similar to those of its natural equivalent.
Table: The upper horizontal surface of a faceted gem.
Table Cut: The simplest type of step cut which is very flat with a large table. Often used for seals or for men's rings.
Table Facet: Central facet on a gem's crown.
Talisman: A trinket or piece of jewelry thought to be a protection against evil.
Tanzania: A country of east-central Africa on the Indian Ocean.
Tanzanite: A beautiful Bluish Purple Gemstone Mined in Tanzania .
Tennis Bracelet: A bracelet containing many small gemstones, such as diamonds, that are set one after the other into a narrow chain.
Titanium: A strong, low-density, highly corrosion-resistant, lustrous white metallic element that occurs widely in igneous rocks and is used to alloy aircraft metals for low weight, strength, and high-temperature stability.
Tourmaline: A complex crystalline silicate containing aluminum, boron, and other elements.
Translucent: Clear; permitting the passage of light.
Transparency: The quality or state of being transparent.
Tsavorite: Can be considered a "new" gemstone since it was unknown before its discovery in Kenya in the 1960s. It is a member of the garnet family group in which trace amounts of vanadium and chromium provide the green color.
Ultrasonic Cleaner: Used to clean jewelry by using energy released from the collapse of millions of microscopic cavitations bubbles, which are formed when ultrasound passes through the cleaning liquid.
White Gold: An alloy of gold and nickel, sometimes also containing palladium or zinc, having a pale platinum like color.
White Topaz: A colorless aluminum silicate mineral, often found in association with granite rocks and valued as a gemstone.
Yellow Gold: Gold that has been alloyed with a mix of 50% copper and 50% silver.
Zircon: A brown to colorless mineral, which is heated, cut, and polished to form a brilliant blue-white gem. |
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