History of Ceylon Gems and Jewelry

Precambrian Age: Period starts with the birth of Earth and the gradual appearance of many-celled animals, about 570 million years ago. Nine-tenths of the island of Sri Lanka is underlain by rocks of Precambrian age. The Precambrian crystalline rocks of Sri Lanka are divided into three major units: the Highland group, the Southwestern group, and the Vijayan Complex.

1st Century AD: The historical chronicle of Sri Lanka, the Mahavamsa, records that gemstones were among the gifts of Sri Lanka's king, Devanampiyatissa, to Emperor Ashoka of India. The Mahavansa also records that the Buddha visited Sri Lanka to settle a dispute between the Naga King Mahodara and Prince Chulodara over a throne studded with gemstones.


5th Century AD: The Buddhist monk, Fa-Hien, reports on the mineral abundance of the land when he visits Sri Lanka.

13th Century AD: The Venetian traveler, Marco Polo, reaches the shores of Sri Lanka. He writes: "The island produces more beautiful and valuable rubies than are found in any other part of the world. Likewise sapphires, topazes, amethysts, garnets, and many other precious and costly stones. The king is supposed to possess one of the grandest rubies that ever was seen, being a span in length and the thickness of a man's arm, brilliant beyond description, and without a single flaw."

14th Century AD: Visit of Iban Batuta, the Arab traveler from Tangier. He notes that, "Gems are met with in all localities in the island of Sri Lanka. All the women of Serendib possess necklaces of precious stones of diverse colors, they wear them also at their hands and feet, in the forms of bracelets and anklets. I have seen on the forehead of the white elephant several of these precious stones, each of which was larger than a hen's egg."

17th Century AD: Robert Knox, a sailor in the service of the East Indian Company, was captured by the King of Kandy in 1660 and held captive for many years before being released. He wrote: "In this island are several sorts of precious stones, which the King for his part has enough of, and so care th not to have more discoveries made. Also there are certain rivers out of which it is generally reported that they do take rubies and sapphires and cat's eyes for the King's use. And I have seen several pretty colored stones, some as big as cherry stones and some as buttons, and transparent, but understood not what they were. Rubies and sapphires I myself have seen."

Ceylon Ruby

Ruby is an aluminum oxide, a variety of corundum; it occurs in medium to dark tones of red and violet-red to brownish-red.

Ruby is the most popular and highest priced colored stone of all time and its being used in King's crowns through out the history.

The Burmese believed that "blazing red" stones could be found in a "bottomless" valley. Natives threw pieces of meat into the valley, hoping that some stones could then be recovered by killing the vultures. In the Royal Collection of England, you can view a gold ring set with a pale but nearly flawless ruby into which a portrait of Louis XII of France is carved.

The most important factor in the value of a ruby is color. The top qualities are as red as you can imagine: a saturated pure spectral hue without any overtones of brown or blue. The word red is derived from the Latin word for ruby, rubier, which is derived from similar words in Persian, Hebrew, and Sanskrit. The intensity of color of a fine ruby is like a glowing coal, probably the most intensely colored substance our ancestors ever saw. It is no wonder they ascribed magical powers to these fires that burned perpetually and never extinguished themselves.

Besides color, other factors that influence the value of a ruby are clarity, cut, and size. Rubies that are perfectly transparent, with no tiny flaws, are more valuable than those with inclusions, which are visible to the eye. Cut can make a big difference in how attractive and lively a ruby appears to the eye. A well-cut stone should reflect back light evenly across the surface without a dark or washed-out area in the center that can result from a stone that is too deep or shallow. The shape should also be symmetrical and there should not be any nicks or scratches in the polish. Rubies and other gemstones are sold per carat, a unit of weight equal to one-fifth of a gram. Larger rubies, because they are more rare, will cost more per carat than smaller stones of the same quality.

The Ruby sometimes displays a three-ray, six-point star. These star rubies are cut in a smooth domed cabochon cut to display the effect. The star is most visible when illuminated with a single light source: it moves across the stone as the light moves. This effect, called asterism, is caused by light reflecting off tiny rutile needles, called "silk," which are oriented along the crystal faces.

The value of star rubies and sapphires are influenced by two factors: the intensity and attractiveness of the body color and the strength and sharpness of the star. All six legs should be straight and equally prominent. Star rubies rarely have the combination of a fine translucent or transparent color and a sharp prominent star. These gems are valuable and expensive.

The most famous source of fine rubies is Burma, which is now called Myanmar. The ruby mines of Myanmar date back to centuries ago: stone age and bronze age mining tools have been found in the mining area of Mogok. Rubies from the legendary mines in Mogok often have a pure red color, sometimes described as "pigeon's-blood", although that term is more fanciful than an actual practical standard in the trade today. Myanmar also produces intense pinkish red rubies, which are vivid and extremely beautiful. Many of the rubies from Burma have a strong fluorescence when exposed to ultraviolet rays like those in sunlight, which layers on extra color. Burma rubies have a reputation of holding their vivid color under all lighting conditions.

Sri Lankan stones are often pinkish in hue and many are pastel in tone. Some, however, resemble the vivid pinkish red hues from Burma. Rubies from Kenya and Tanzania surprised the world when they were discovered in the sixties because their color rivals the world's best. Unfortunately, most of the ruby production from these countries has many inclusions, tiny flaws that diminish transparency. Rubies from the African mines are rarely transparent enough to facet. However, their fantastic color is displayed to full advantage when cut in the cabochon style. A few rare clean stones of top quality have been seen.

Occasionally a few fine, top-quality rubies appear on the market from Afghanistan, Pakistan or the Pamir Mountains of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The terrain in these areas has made exploration for gemstones very difficult but someday they may produce significant quantities for the world market.

Tucson Gem Show

America's gem festival of the year - the Tucson international gem show - successfully ended in February. It began 54 years ago as a class room exhibition of gems and minerals designed for the public by a geology professor at the Arizona State University USA. Today it has grown to become the world's largest gem-jewelry-mineral-fossil show.

Every new year season (January - February), the desert city of Tucson begins to dazzle with a myriad of colors as thousands of exhibitors and dealers from across the world display their glittering precious stones.

Major gem exhibits at Tucson convention centers and hotels are the AGTA (American Gem Traders Association), GJX (Gem and Jewelry Exchange) show and the WGJ (World Wide Gem and Jewelry) show. Among these AGTA and GJX are the most popular with over 2000 exhibitors at each show. Exhibitors form the United States, Europe and Asia dominate the show. Sri Lanka, Thailand, India, Myanmar, China, and Japan are represented in different pavilions at the major gem shows.

The Sri Lankan exhibitors numbering over 100 exhibitors participate at two major shows in Tucson. Having participated for over 30 years, many Sri Lankan dealers do extremely well in promoting Sri Lanka's top quality blue sapphires, padmaraga and other gem stones. Also many lapidary dealers succeed in getting quotas of cutting orders fro factories thereby generating more employment in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB) paved the way for Sri Lanka's participation in Tucson initially with four exhibitors. The number grew steadily and today it has risen to more than 100 dealers taking part in the Tucson festival.

In addition a multitude of gem and mineral and fossil shows are held in small hotels and motels around the city. An array of precious stones including diamonds, emeralds, sapphire and jade is a boon to buyers in selecting the best at competitive prices.

More than 50,000 buyers, many of them from the USA, Europe and Japan attend Tucson gem and jewelry festival. Visitors find traveling easier with an excellent shuttle bus service connecting the gem shows. The 38 shows are within easy reach by the Garnet route, Sapphire route, Emerald route, B-Line, A-Line, and many more shuttles. The buyers shop through the entries during the two week festival. Small dealers exhibitors earn an income at motels and wayside boutiques.

Sri Lanka gem dealers should do their best in promoting Facets Sri Lanka - the nations's gem festival. It needs to reach the level of a major international gem show.

This country has much to learn from the Tucson Gem Show in finding greater opportunities to promote the island's precious stones.

Choosing a Sapphire

Choosing a Sapphire

The most famous sources for sapphire are Kashmir and Burma, (now known as Myanmar). Kashmir sapphire, which was discovered in 1881 when a landslide in the Himalayas uncovered beautiful blue pebbles, has a rich velvety color prized by connoisseurs. Burma sapphires, from the same region that produces fabulous rubies, are also very fine. However, today, these two sources account for a very small quantity of the sapphire on the market.

Most fine sapphire on the market today comes from Sri Lanka, which produces a wide range of beautiful blues from delicate sky blue colors to rich saturated hues. Kanchanaburi in Thailand and Pailin in Cambodia are renowned for deep blue, even colors. Two relatively new mining localities are showing promise: Madagascar, which has produced some exceptionally fine stones in small sizes but has no organized mining yet, and Tanzania, which has long produced sapphire in other colors but is starting to produce blue colors as well from a new deposit in the south.

The most valuable sapphires have a medium intense, vivid blue color. The best sapphires hold the brightness of their color under all different types of lighting. Any black, grey, or green overtones mixed in with the blue will reduce a stone's value. In general, a more pastel blue would be less preferred than a vivid blue but would be priced higher than an overly dark blackish-blue color. As with all gemstones, sapphires, which are "clean" and have few visible inclusions or tiny flaws are the most valuable.

Sapphires are most often cut in a cushion shape - a rounded rectangle - or an oval shape. You can also find smaller sapphires in round brilliant cuts or a wide variety of fancy shapes, including triangles, squares, emerald cuts, marquises, pear shapes, baguette shapes, cabochon cuts and smooth domes.

Ceylon Sapphires

Sapphire is an aluminum oxide. Its color varies from very light to dark blue and varieties of colorless (white sapphire), yellow, violet, pink, green and the pinkish-orange (padparadscha sapphire).

Sapphires are generally treated with x-ray and heat to intensify their color. Natural sapphires undergo heat and diffusion treatments almost always. Treatment of blue stones is permanent.

Ceylon Sapphires

The Ceylon Blue Sapphire is known for its beauty – possessing the glorious cornflower blue shade – as well as for being one of the few sapphires in the world that can be sold as a completely natural stone without heat treatment. The blues aside, Ceylon sapphires also come in beautiful hues including pink, yellow, orange, green, purple, lavender and of course, the inimitable padparadscha sapphire (Pink-Orange). All these highly marketable qualities of Ceylon sapphire has created brand recognition world wide - a brand not created by the producers of the stone, but by the sellers and consumers.

Sapphires that show a star-like light effect are called star sapphires; the most famous star sapphire from Sri Lanka is displayed in the Museum of Natural History in New York. Star sapphires or star rubies display a star-like marking and this effect, commonly known as asterism, occurs when light falls on the cut stone, cut in the cabochon form, and three rays appear giving a six-point star.

Lastly, there is milky corundum, a white opaque form of corundum also called geuda, which for many years was regarded as useless and discarded, often ending up lining fish tanks in some gemstone merchant's house. This happened until dealers in Thailand learned to heat-treat geudas to change the color of the stone from an unattractive cloudy grey-white to a bright, sparkling blue. They completed the work nature began and ended up with a blue sapphire - of much greater value than a useless pebble. The color of heat-treated blue sapphires are stable and the chemical composition of the stone is that of a sapphire, although prices are lower than for a similar quality stone with natural color.

Blue Sapphires

Ceylon (Sri Lanka) Blue Sapphires are the world's finest blue sapphires. The most valuable blue sapphires are those with cornflower blue color.

The color of blue sapphires are vary from very light blue to very dark black like blue color with various tones.

Generally blue sapphires are heat treated to enhance the color and remove some inclusions.

Heat treatments of sapphires are acceptable.

Blue Sapphire is the birthstone of September and it is widely use a healing stone for astronomical purposes. Also blue sapphires are using with diamonds to make high value jewelry. Next to diamonds and ruby, blue sapphires are the most valuable gemstone in the market. The most common shapes are oval and cushion with step cut, but there are other shapes also.