[GEMSTONES FORMATION]
When gems are mined, they are actually removed from where they are today. Mines for gem mining are found on the surface or at a certain depth, inside ancient craters of volcanoes and even in the depths of the sea. But for the most part, the gems were not formed in the place from which they were mined. The "Millennium Star" diamond, for example, a rare diamond famous for its purity and excellent color, was mined from alluvial materials washed away by river currents. But the "millennium star" was not created in streams on the surface of the earth. The journey of the diamond to the De Beers Millennium Jewelry Collection, as well as the journey of most of the gems we know today, began, like any good story, many years ago and far away from here.
Metamorphism
Some of the gems are created in a process called metamorphism, or in Hebrew Tamra. It is a process in which existing rocks are heated, melted and recrystallized. There are several types of metamorphism. Contact Metamorphism occurs when the hot trend is pushed close to the Earth's surface. The hot body "bakes" the rocks around it and changes them. Gemstones from the garnet family which includes pyrope, almandine, rhodolite and other stones can be formed in such a process.
Regional metamorphism is another type of metamorphism. In this process, rocks that are already on the surface are buried deep and subsequently exposed to tremendous pressures and high temperatures of up to 900 degrees Celsius! If the pressure and temperature are high enough, new rocks will form. In such rocks you can find different stones, among others the ruby and the sapphire.
Sedimentary
Gems can even form in bodies of water. Opal, for example, is formed in hot aqueous solutions that are rich in the element silica . When the solutions cool, sediments settle in them, also called sediments, from which the opal is formed. Rocks formed in this process are called sedimentary rocks. The "Muzo" emerald in Colombia was also created in an aquatic environment, in a hydrothermal process - heating of groundwater and crystallisations within it.
There are many methods for the formation of gemstones and they are different and varied. But all those formation environments are actually part of the "rock circle" that exists in nature. Any rock can begin its life by solidifying out of the trend, climb its way to the surface, undergo weathering and be deposited in bodies of water, solidify as a sedimentary rock and then be buried deep and undergo metamorphosis. This is actually the amazing mechanism of nature, which creates, among its other wonders, also the gems.
