Posted on 06/11/2021 11:51:04 AM PDT by Red Badger
At 563 carats, the Star of India is the world’s largest gem-quality blue star sapphire, and is approximately 2 billion years old. (Image credit: D. Finnin/Copyright AMNH)
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What does the legendary Star of India — a 563-carat star sapphire the size of a golf ball — have in common with a 35-million-year-old petrified redwood slab; a massive cluster of sword-like crystals that looks like it came from "Game of Thrones;" and a 5-ton (4.5-metric ton) stone pillar that can "sing?"
You can see all of them, along with 5,000 other amazing stones, in the newly renovated Mignone Hall of Gems and Minerals at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City, which is reopening after a four-year closure on Saturday (June 12). There, one-of-a-kind precious gems appear alongside odd-looking rocks — some of which date to billions of years ago — that have been uniquely warped and twisted by extreme temperatures and pressures.
Individually and together, these objects tell a story of the diverse geologic processes that shape minerals on Earth's surface and deep inside our planet, beginning when the world was young and continuing to this day, museum representatives told Live Science.
Related: 13 mysterious and cursed gemstones
The Star of India, which formed about a billion years ago, was discovered in Sri Lanka in the 18th century. It is one of the best-known gems in the world, in part because it was famously and brazenly stolen from AMNH in 1964, along with several more of the museum's prized stones, by a pair of thieves named Jack "Murf the Surf" Murphy and Allan Kuhn, Smithsonian reported in 2014, on the heist's 50th anniversary. (The one-of-a-kind sapphire was recovered and went back on display in 1965).
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Poor Allan needs a cool nickname. Something like Kuhn Hound.
a few thousand years old, not billions...don’t be ridiculous
The Star of India a ship in San Diego bay
>>At 563 carats, the Star of India is the world’s largest gem-quality blue star sapphire, and is approximately 2 billion years old.
I would love to go there
I’m gonna go out on a limb here and guess you’re not a geologist.
Imagine being the poor serf that started polishing that rock in the first place, slowly revealing THAT! WOW!
I, of course, prefer Opals, but Mom likes a showy Sapphire. ;)
Bkmk
My St. Helens eruption created petrified wood
Collagen in T. rex skin
Thousands of animals in the so called Cretaceous and Jurassic period still alive today
Don’t have to be a geologist to see the obvious
“I’m gonna go out on a limb here and guess you’re not a geologist.”
And the earth is still the center of the universe... It never ceases to amaze me how a salesman and opportunistic cleric could have such lasting influence with a theory that defies all physical reality.
When Ussher stole and re-sold this theory from Lightfoot with a new creation date just to gain notoriety and favor in the church and king’s court, Galileo had been excommunicated only 17 years earlier. Reality has come a long way since, it is no longer the 1500s...
Yet... It still continues.
Thanks a fool in paradise. Good one for the Digest ping.
“Poor Allan needs a cool nickname. Something like Kuhn Hound.”
He ain’t The Hudson Hawk, thats for sure.
They had the sales receipt, and it clearly said, Kroger Jewelers, 1126 am, 2,000,000,000 BC, register 26b.
So there, Mr Skeptic!
The photo caption says 2 billion years old. The story text says 1 billion years old. American literacy continues to deteriorate. But definitely very old as God planned it for our amazement. Stop diminishing God by limiting his years and creations.
I think many people are frightened of a God who could create a universe the is something like 13 billion years old. It is far more comforting to confine Him to a more readily graspable limit of 6,000 years. Of course, if my ancestors came from Chatal Huyak (sp?) I would be really pixxed.
I’ve got a cut diamond only a little smaller than that at 1 ⅛" in diameter… square cube law makes a big difference in mass for little size gain but huge mass increase. My diamond is 121 carats at 1 ⅛" but another diamond which was only ⅛" larger in diameter was more than twice as massive at 247 carats! You could hardly tell them apart as they had the same cut and were proportional.
I’ve been trying to figure out a proper mounting for it as at over 24 grams in weight it’s obviously too large and heavy (0.85 ounce) before adding gold for a mount for a ring… I’m leaning toward a cane topper, a gearshift knob, or a big club head knocker of a sceptor! Got any other suggestions?
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