It is complicated work to describe such prominent gemstone as Diamond in a nutshell due to its significance in the mineral kingdom and the jewelry market. Nonetheless, we must look at this precious stone from the different viewpoints to learn its indeed historical, scientific and market value. In any case, we’ll try to describe it briefly, because we mentioned already many interesting facts about this stone in the article titled "April Birthstone."

It is essential to know the history of Diamond, including the questions of its origin and actual value. Because, the understanding of these topics will allow the customer to understand many important terms, such as "conflict free diamonds," "Birthstones,"  "mother rings," etc. The history, legends, and customs concerning any of gems, including Diamond, contains a clue to learning these terms (and many others).

Origin of Diamond & its brief history

The history of Diamond lasts many centuries. But the reliable sources tell us that these gemstones first discovered in India. Moreover, they were unknown in Europe and the US until 1700. The first diamond market was located between Madras and Bob May. The district called "Golconda" was a diamond trading center in those days. Though the new Indian Diamond mines located in Madras Presidency in Southern India, Chutia Nagpur province, and Bundelkhand. If you love to travel, you must pay a visit to these places.

Despite the popularity of Indian Diamond, numerous attempts to find the mines in other regions were undertaken on the regular base. Thus, in 1728, the gold miners of Brazil unexpectedly discovered the diamond mines located in this district. The discovery of the Portugal deposits in Minas Geraes, Lencaes, on the Salobro followed soon. Eventually, the development of South African mines followed in 1867.

The sources say that the miners used children to discerning small diamonds among the clay and golden crumbs. After all, the only young eye was capable of doing this correctly. Furthermore, many slaves employed in the diamond mines removed from the job being blind.

By the way, any slave might obtain freedom if he finds a diamond weighing in at 17 and a half ounces. As a result, many slaves died in these mines, whence the term "Blood Diamond" appeared. In our time, was using the term "conflict free diamonds."

Conflict Free Diamonds

What does this word mean? Conflict free Diamonds are these stones that arrived from the countries free of any conflict or violence. Therefore, otherwise, all other Diamonds are the "blood diamonds," according to this term. But we learned this word much later. Therefore, now we discuss only such countries like Angola, Côte D'Ivoire, Sierra Leone and other, belonged to any colonial power. A French traveler named Tavernier was the first who described the violence and child exploitation in the mines.

'"It is pleasant," says Tavernier, to see the sons of these merchants, and of other people of the country, from the age of ten to that of fifteen or sixteen, coming every morning, and seating themselves under a large tree in the marketplace of the town." -- Louis Dieulafait "Diamond and Precious Stones," 1874.

The Value of Diamond

What is the Diamond? It's hard to believe, but chemically, Diamond is substantially a pure carbon. We may find the curious description of this fact while studying the impressions by Julius Wodiska. He was surprised to discover the fact that the lampblack and diamond consist the same base substance. However, the genuine Diamond is the most durable substance known to the world. It is one of its valuable properties.

Why do we need to know this? Being the most durable subject in the "universe" (who knows?), the only way to check the genuineness of diamond it is to try to scratch it using inferior gemstone, according to the Mohs Hardness Scale. For this purpose, we could use such stone as Corundum (Ruby or Sapphire). So if the Corundum can scratch your Diamond, you must be sure that this is fake!

Despite the fact that a Diamond is the hardest mineral and gemstone, it also possesses remarkable brilliancy due of its single refraction, whence its second name "a brilliant.". Many other gems possess double refraction.

Another distinctive property of this great stone is its transcalency. It is also an important feature of a diamond since this is one of the simplest ways to detect the real diamond among all of the fakes and imitations. The simple device called "Moissanite Detector" and its inferior analogs able to distinguish this precious stone from semi precious stones, its inferior specimens, and fakes.

Synthetic Diamonds, HPHT & CVD

It will not be superfluous to mention that overwhelming majority of the diamonds, represented at the online stores and jewelry shops, are of synthetic origin. Of course, this statement may be doubtful. Nonetheless, we are not talking about "all of them."

Nevertheless, let’s learn what the "cultivated diamonds" are. Similar to cultivated pearls (Mikimoto Pearls), the synthetic or cultivated diamonds are the stones made artificially. Despite the method of production, these diamonds are still natural. Let’s remember that Diamond is just a pure carbon, therefore using the specialized equipment. Carbon under pressure turns into Diamond.

There are two varieties of the cultivated diamonds called HPHT diamonds & CVD diamonds, depending on the production method. Nonetheless, the true natural diamonds are still more valuable than its artificial "varieties."