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Sapphire - Very Rough Sapphire (Ref RBx7)
£ 12.00
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Sapphire - Very Rough Sapphire (Ref RBx7)
A very rough Sapphire 

Size    2.2cm x 2.2cm
Depth 1.4cm

Weight approximately 16.8g

Sapphire is a variety of corundum, an aluminium oxide. It forms in prismatic, bipyramidal, rhombohedral or tabular crystals, and it can also occur in granular or massive habits. It is found in metamorphic and igneous rocks, as well as alluvial deposits.
 


Fine Sapphires have been discovered in India, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Thailand, Madagascar, Tanzania, Pakistan, Afghanistan, East Africa and Australia. In the USA, beautiful pale bluing violet Sapphires, as well as a pastel palette of other colours, have been found in Yogo Gulch, Montana.

Although people most often think of Sapphire as dark blue, it is found in a diversity of colours, including many shades of blue, violet, pink, white, green, black, yellow and orange. In fact, all colours of corundum (apart from red, which is called Ruby) are know as Sapphire.

The colouring pigment of blue Sapphire is iron and titanium, and in violet Sapphire the pigment is vanadium. A low iron content brings about yellow or green Sapphires, and chrome produces pink ones.

Sapphire was used by the Etruscans over 2,500 years ago and was prized in ancient Rome, Greece and Egypt. Today the world’s most abundant source of Sapphire is Australia, though the stone is also mined in East Africa, India, Pakistan, Africa and the United States.


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