Sapphire Gemstones
"Sapphire gemstones are most often blue."
Sapphire derives its name from the Greek sappheiros meaning blue stone and belongs to the corundum family of mineral, so it is sister to the Ruby.
Blue is the most converted colour of the Sapphire, the brightest of mid to royal-blue commanding the highest price, though from a collector’s view the orange Padmaraga romps home easily in second place.
This flower-garden of gems occur in purple, violet, clear-white, orange, brown, green, darkest of blue, black and a combination of multi-colours in one stone.
Pink Sapphires change their name to Ruby as the colour deepens.
Star Sapphires are awe inspiring.
Because of the remarkable hardness of Sapphires they are used in many non-ornamental applications, including infrared optical components and fine surgical blades.
Sapphires are mined primary from underground workings in Burma, Madacaska, Sri Lanka, Australia, America, Thailand, India, Pakistan, Tanzania, Africa and China.
Russia’s Catherine the Great favoured a Sapphire which weighed a massive 337 ct.
Queen Marie Antoinette wore a seven-piece jewellery set containing approximately 29 sapphires, of which 18 are stones of perhaps 20 ct or more.
Natural corundum crystals are usually a barrel-shaped prismatic form or a tapering spindle-shape.
Sapphire. By irrational_cat
This page was written by Magda Palmer, a gemmologist and the author of The Healing Power of Crystals
, Precious Stones
and Feng Shui Student
Manual
, which I
highly recommend.Back to List of Gemstones
