Garnet Jewelry
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Unlike other Garnet varieties Garnet gems appear in many colours, extending from colorless, yellow, and green to exceptional pink.
The most common deep red Garnets are Pyrope, which is what most people mean when they say "Garnet." Pyrope Garnet is found many places in the United States, particularly in Arizona where the pebbles are excavated by ants while digging their holes. The ants then deposit the gems in their refuse mounds, giving this stone the name "ant-hill" Garnet! Garnets are able to withstand enormous heat, up to 1400 degrees Fahrenheit. It derives its name from the Latin-granutus , meaning "like a grain" (i.e., a 'pomegranate seed').
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Garnets are a group of related minerals, containing cubic crystalline structure with slight variations in their chemical compositions. In all, there are 7 types of Garnets, which include Almandine, Pyrope, Spessartine, Grossular, Andradite, Rhodolite and Malaia.
The various types of Garnets are comprised of different chemical components but all share a Refractive Index of 1.72 1.94, Specific Gravity of 3.40 4.30 and Hardness of 6.5 7.5 on the Mohs Scale. Garnets are found in a variety of locations around the world including: Kenya, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Brazil, India & Arizona (USA).
Legend
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Garnet has been dubbed the gem of faith, constancy and truth. Asiatic tribes carved garnet gems into bullets in the belief that their fiery color would inflict more deadly wounds. They were ground into powder for the treatment of fever or jaundice. If the cure didn't work, the apothecary was accused of using an imitation.
Another source tells that:in 1905 a Garnet necklace dating from 3500 BC was found in Egypt around the neck of a young male's mummified body. It reportedly also gives its wearer guidance in the night, protection from nightmares, and according to the Egyptians, is an antidote for snake bites and food poisoning. It was also thought to have a special affinity with the blood.
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Colour
When evaluating Garnets, color is the most important characteristic.
Garnet is a hard, durable, often very brilliant stone, available in many colors. Garnets are found in every color except blue, including brilliant green tsavorite garnet, raspberry pink rhodolite garnet, and orange Malaya garnet. The Tsars of Russia favored rare green demantoid garnets, which are more highly dispersive than diamond. Tsavorite is a member of the garnet family and is often mistaken for other gems. It is one of the most beautiful, and all but a few would assume it was an emerald of the finest quality.
In fact, it is "clearer", more brilliant, and more durable. There is also a rarer green garnet, called demantoid, which costs slightly more than tsavorite but which, although slightly softer, has more fire. These gems offer fine alternatives to the person desiring a lovely green gem who can't afford emerald. While still rare, expensive gems themselves, they are far less expensive than an emerald of comparable quality. Rhodolite Garnet is distinguished from others of the Garnet family by its pink-violet to purple-red color. One of the lesser known Garnets, it as actually a Pyrope-Almandine mix giving it a pleasing rhododendron-like color. The original locality for Rhodolite was Cowee Creek, North Carolina. Stones found there are small, but new finds in Africa have yielded gems over 25 carats(1carat=200mg).
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