Black diamonds are considered the rarest of the fancy colored diamonds. . . or were.
I wear a rose gold and Tungsten Carbide 15.45 carat Black Diamond ring and my girlfriend wears a yellow gold 6.5 carat Black Diamond ring with 28 champagne diamond ring. She and I designed these rings as our "un-marriage, commitment rings" because at our ages, we did not want to complicate our respective estates.
Designs by Swordmaker and Kathy,
Builds and Photo credit: AK Jewelers, Sacramento, CA
No black diamonds have ever been found or mined with regular white or colored diamonds. Because of their Hydrogen content, It is thought they all come from a single source, a giant asteroid, which was a single black diamond, estimated to have been a kilometer in diameter, that was born in the center of a supernova that occurred before the Earth was created. This black diamond asteroid is thought to have hit the earth between 2 billion and 2.5 billion years ago right between where Africa and South America were joined as part of a super-continent (it may have been what triggered their separation). That would make Black Diamonds among the oldest stones on Earth.
Up until about ten years ago, all black diamonds except three were the size of a pea or smaller and were found strewn along the ground in Central South Africa and in central South America, or were panned out of streams in both places. Most were about the size of a grain of sand. These you still see in jewelry stores today as pave black diamond Jewelry with itty bitty stones. These are thought to have been shards that broke off the main body of the asteroid as it hit the Earth long ago.
The three large black diamonds were the 667 carat Black Orloff, about the size of half an egg in the Russian Czar's scepter, the 68 carat Small Orlof, also in the Russian Crown jewels, and a 37 carat smaller stone which is mounted in a ring. However, about ten years ago large black diamonds started appearing that were not under the control of the DeBeers Diamond Cartel or the Russian Diamond merchants. Apparently someone dug into a lode of large format black diamonds in Africa, perhaps even the main body of the huge asteroid and started selling them. These are being cut in India and Israel.
I bought quite a few when they were pretty inexpensive several years ago. . . but they are now going up rapidly. A very large one I bought which at 91.86 carats puts the historic Small Orlof and that other 37 carat black diamond that were #2 and #3 in the world ten years ago completely out of the running as large Black Diamond records. I just got it out on my safe and took some photos of it for you.
91.86 carat black diamond, 1.127" in diameter.
But my ~92 carat round cut black diamond is not even in the running for the top 25 largest black diamonds today!!!! I was looking at one that weighed in at an amazing 225 carats! Another I saw was over 450 carats! I decided to bypass it because I can't figure out what to do with the one I have that is an 1.127" in diameter as it is! The 225 was only 1.275" in diameter, not that much bigger, just heavier. Gear shift knob? Cane topper? That size diamond is just too damn big for jewelry. It's too pointy on the back for a pendant. Besides, I gave my girlfriend a smaller, better one for a pendant with multiple stones. Got any ideas???