goldstone?

[zdrastvootya]

My wife has a rounded orangy sparkling stone (small fingernail size). I don''t know what it is. Her mother gave it to her (probably bought in hong kong).

We showed it to our diamond dealer and he said it was a goldstone, but described it as natural or genuine. He also said it was aka oroclase feldspar.

After researching, I''m confused. Goldstone is man-made: glass with bits of copper in it. Natural goldstone seems to be aventurine and looks quite different. Wife''s stone looks like pictures of goldstone (man-made) that I''ve seen on the ''net. Also, wife''s mother calls it "gold stone" in Chinese.

Is my diamond guy mistaken? (Sure seems like it.)

Z.

 

[Barbara]

Hi Z,

Names are dangerous, aren''t they? Not only do we have similants, tradenames and folknames to worry about, but then there are language and culture differences that affect gem names.

I haven''t heard the translucent to opaque feldspar from India called goldstone before (the usual term is sunstone), but you can probably tell it from glass with your loupe. In diffused lighting get a good look inside the stone and look for either bubbles or swirl marks -- glasses, man made or natural almost always have some.

Here are pictures of the front and back of a natural feldspar sunstone of the type I''m describing. These were more popular before the more transparent Oregon and Tanzanian sunstones entered the market.

Barbara