Properties
About Spessartite
Spessartite is a maganese-aluminium mineral species belonging to the garnet group. Spessartite is an orange to red-brown gemstone and its name comes from the Bavarian word, “Spessart”, meaning “forest”, which is a mountain range in Germany where spessartine garnet deposits were found in the 1880s.
History
Spessartite was not often seen in jewellery until deposits were mined in Namibia and Mozambique in the 1990s.
Sources
Countries producing spessartite include Australia, Myanmar, India, Afghanistan, Israel, Madagascar, Tanzania and the United States.
Quality
The spessartite garnet group includes the colour-change and malaya varieties. Colour-change garnets are rare and is highly prized. Colour change garnet changes colour in different light sources. Colour-change garnet is typically a hybrid of spessartite and pyrope garnet. Malaya garnet is another garnet variety that possess interesting and unique colours, such as pinkish-orange, reddish-orange and yellowish-orange with scintillating flashes of red.
Trivia
Malaya garnet gets its name from the Swahili word meaning “outcast” or “prostitute”. This is because when malaya garnet was first discovered, it didn’t fit into the accepted garnet categories and was therefore cast aside.
