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Lapis lazuli is one of the wonderful and popular semi-precious stones in the manufacture of various types of jewelry due to its availability and relatively low price in addition to its unique characteristics and distinctive appearance. In addition, it has been used in jewelry making for thousands of years. Lapis lazuli is distinguished by its rich blue color in addition to the sparkling spots of iron pyrite that give an enchanting mixture to the stone, giving it an attractive appearance. To the extent that it is difficult to distinguish between the original stone from it outwardly and the imitation and to know the difference between them. As there are many minerals and semi-precious stones that can be dyed to imitate this stone such as low quality jasper, white howlite, calcite, spinel, and sodalite, while glass and plastic are also used to imitate this stone. Fortunately, despite the large number of imitations of lapis lazuli, there are some simple and easy tips that are useful that may help you to know the genuine lapis lazuli of good quality and avoid imitation.
Ways and means of identifying the natural stone of lapis lazuli
1- Check stone price: require Genuine lapis lazuli stones are relatively expensive compared to the manufactured ones. So if you see a group of lapis lazuli at cheap prices, know that they are imitation or poor quality dyed stones.
2- Low-quality lapis lazuli stones can be dyed: The lapis lazuli stone consists of a mixture of It is made of several minerals, including lapis lazurite, which gives the stone its distinctive blue color, white calcite, dark gray blue sodalite, and small gold pieces of iron pyrite. The price of the stone can be distinguished by the minerals in it, To clarify: If the white color is found in abundance in the stone, then it is classified according to It is the cheapest calcite, while if blue-gray is also found in abundance, it is sodalite. Low-quality lapis lazuli can be dyed to make people more desirable and better, so keep that in mind. To it is dyed if it is of poor quality. So to test the stone to see if it is dyed or not, simply wipe the stone with acetone or alcohol. The result will show what it is; If it loses its color, it is either an imitation stone or it is of poor quality and has been dyed to imitate good quality stones.
3- Hardness Test: The hardness of the original lapis lazuli is 5.5 on the Mohs scale, while the hardness of the lapis lazuli is 5.5 on the Mohs scale. Diamond hardness to 391. There are many instruments by which the degree of hardness can be measured. So if the degree of hardness differs with the degree of the original stone, then this stone is not original.
4- Composition Check: Iron sulfur (also known as iron pyrite) in stone. There are random small gold specks and small streaks of dark metallic gold in the stone. The presence of these spots is a very good thing as iron sulfur is surprisingly difficult to imitate. Even if it is imitated, it usually ends up being largely made of the original real stone.
5- Reshaped lapis lazuli stones: They are reconstructed from small parts of the remains of the stone that have been reconstructed. Extracting them and mixing them with each other to make a new bead or stone of lapis lazuli, and this would affect the quality of the stone greatly. This also does not mean that the stone is imitation because it contains lapis lazuli, nor is it considered original. These reconstructed stones often contain tiny, unnatural pebbles that you can touch and look at to distinguish the original stone from others.
6- Color check: If the lapis lazuli stone is Absolutely blue in color and cheap, it is probably not genuine, the best and highest quality of lapis lazuli are stones that are uniform blue color and have virtually no gold spots.
7- The composition of the stone:
Imitation lapis lazuli may be made of plastic but can be easily identified by holding it and tapping it with your teeth. (How lapis lazuli is formed) It is known that those stones made of plastic, if you bring them close to your mouth, you will feel their formation, unlike glass or original gemstones. In addition to that, it will make a quiet rattling sound when you flick it with your teeth, in contrast to glass and stones, it is hard and will therefore emit a louder rattling. 8- Thermal conductivity test: There is another method related to the previous method, which is It is like with many stones; The lapis lazuli stone can be very cold to the touch. Although imitation glass is cool to the touch, it gets hot when held for a while. As for the original gemstones, they remain cool even after being held for fairly long periods. In addition, stones made of glass do not have gold spots, despite the fact that high-quality imitation stones may have such spots.
There are also a variety of advanced procedures for inspecting precious and semi-precious stones that are based on specific instruments, machinery, and technologies that are only available in gem institutes, gem-testing laboratories, and laboratories linked with select jewellery retailers.
