Release date: 30 March 2017 Throughout history, gemstones have been used for personal adornment, ritual practices and as status symbols. During this time the cutting of gemstones has evolved from a limited practice using simple tools into a complex art that uses sophisticated technology to reveal a mineral’s hidden beauty. To be transformed into gemstones, minerals need the following qualities: hardness (resistance to scratches and general wear), beauty (colour, clarity and lustre) and rarity. The minerals must be large enough for cutting and the deposits rich enough to warrant the costs of extraction. As well as widespread mineral deposits, Australia has so far provided more than 200 new minerals, discovered and named for the first time. Australia’s best-known gemstone is precious opal, which was officially designated the national gemstone in 1993. Around 95 per cent of the world’s opal comes from Australia and it is one of the few countries where precious black opal is found. Australia is also known for its diamond industry, which supplies most of the highly valued pink diamonds in the world market. These come from the Argyle diamond mine in the East Kimberley region of Western Australia. Operating since the early 1980s, Argyle has for some years mined the greatest volume of pink diamonds in the world. Sapphires are also significant for Australia’s economy, with several mines in the eastern states contributing to the world market.

The stamps

The four gemstones shown in the stamp designs are held in the mineral collection of the Australian Museum, Sydney. Two of these – the golden sapphire and the pink diamond – represent precious gemstones that are cut and polished as possible centrepieces for exquisite jewellery. The rhodonite and the fluorite exemplify stones that are valued as “collector stones”, rarities that are transformed by lapidaries into singular specimens for the pleasure of gem specialists.

$1 Golden sapphire

Sapphire is a gem variety of the mineral corundum. It can be colourless or occur in a wide range of colours, including yellow, green, orange, purple and parti-coloured (two or more colours in one crystal). Used on its own, the term “sapphire” denotes a blue stone; other colours are given in the description, as in golden sapphire. Red gem corundum is called “ruby”. Blue sapphires are coloured by traces of the elements iron and titanium, golden sapphires owe their colour to highly oxidised iron and rubies owe their red colour to chromium. Sapphire and ruby are the second-hardest gemstones after diamond. This durability, combined with their beautiful colours, makes them very desirable and wearable gemstones. Australia has produced huge quantities of fine sapphire, which washes out of the basaltic remnants of old volcanoes. The Anakie region of central Queensland is particularly known for its large, clear, green and yellow stones. Yellow sapphires can vary from pale yellow through to deep golden hues. The richest golden colours are typically found in Australia. The golden sapphire shown in the stamp design entered the Australian Museum collection in 1984. It came from Tomahawk Creek, a sapphire field near Anakie. At more than seven carats, it is a sizeable stone and an example of the best golden sapphires from this part of Australia.

$1 Rhodonite

Rhodonite is a manganese silicate and found in a number of localities worldwide, including New England, New South Wales. Usually it occurs in opaque masses, pale to deep pink in colour and streaked with black manganese minerals. With other manganese minerals, it is an ore of manganese. Red, transparent rhodonite is in a different class. The faceted gemstone featured in the rhodonite stamp design entered the Australian Museum collection in 2002 and weighs more than two carats. This stone is a rarity because of its rich red colour, its transparent gem quality and its regal pedigree. The material from which it was cut came from Broken Hill, New South Wales – Australia’s gigantic, now largely historic, orebody and the richest source of bright red, translucent to transparent rhodonite crystals in the world. Very few gemstones of any size have been cut from this red rhodonite, which survives today mostly as fine mineral specimens from old collections.

(50931)

SKU 50931
Shipping Weight 0.0100kg
Shipping Width 0.100m
Shipping Height 0.010m
Shipping Length 0.100m
Assembled Length 10.000m
Assembled Height 1.000m

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