Factors Differentiating Semi Precious Stone from Precious Stone

March 02, 2011- Sparkling jewelry whether made from precious or semi precious stones is craved by all women folks. But as the precious stones are rare and more expensive than the semi precious ones so dream of owing those is more. In addition to this difference, which known to a layman there are other differences between these types of stones.

Greeks also used to differentiate between precious and semi-precious stones and in astrological terms there are nine precious stones that are also called 'navaratna' or nine gemstones. These are diamond, ruby, emerald, pearl, red coral, blue sapphire, cats eye, gomedh and yellow sapphire. In modern times there are four precious gem stones that are diamond, emerald, ruby and sapphire. The rest of the stones are semi precious stones. Semi precious stones can be worn as a substitute to precious gem stones. Like you can wear garnet instead of ruby, moonstone instead of pearl and citrine in place of yellow sapphire.

Semi Precious vs Precious Stones

Stone Regulations

The guidelines for the term "precious" and "semi precious" is defined by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to categorize them. But the list of this classification is not permanent as the popularity of stones keeps on changing and so does the market trends.

Rare stones are precious and the one that are available in large deposits are semi precious. But here also changes keep on happening. Amethyst earlier was a precious stone but now it is in the list of semi precious stones as large deposits of it was found.

Quality of Stone

Quality of a stone whether precious of semi precious affects its value to a great extent. Like you can actually have a low quality diamond at a cost lower than that of higher quality aquamarine stone although later is a semi precious stone and diamond as everyone knows is a precious stone. Same goes with Tanzanite, that is limited but semi precious stone. It AAA blue color is more in price than many other precious stones.

Price of the Stone

Price is one of the factors to differentiate precious and semi precious tone but this always is not true. Semi precious stone Tanzanite which is also rare cost around $100 per carat where as low quality diamond can be purchased at $200 or less. So price sometimes can be deceptive so do not run after this factor to decide the precious and semi precious stone.