Review : “Gemstones Of The World” - book by Walter Schumann (1st edition 1977)

I bought this book second hand for my daughter, who has had a long time fascination with gemstones. I remember my own childhood fascination walking around the fields looking for old stone age flint tools, and the fascination of the different looks and feels of even just the ordinary stones that were to be found in the soil.

There is just something fascinating about the subject of gemstones. Their rarity and their attractive colours, transparancy and cuttings. Gemstones are very uncommon in my part of the world, since it is land mostly based on chalk sediments. Amber is the most common “gemstone” here, which is not a gem.

What is attractive about this book is its precise, sytematical and methodical approach to describing the different stones. It is well balanced so that both the layman can find the information he needs, while the advanced specialist can look up all sorts of aspects like hardness, colours, refraction, chemical composition, crystal system and much more. All presented in an easy to understand and easy to find format.

There a lists of famous diamonds, types of cuts, tables of absorbtion Spectras, descriptions of pleochronism (colourchanges depending on angle of view), specific gravities and much more. There is a short intro to how they form and why they end up with certain structures. There are comparative lists of commercisl and scientific names. Then there are lots of colour photos of all (?) the mentioned gemstones in both rough and cut versions. For 1977, these are fairly decent pictures, even if they do have that usual 70s brownish tint to them (why was brown such a prodominant colour and shade back then?)

Highly recommended book

This is the hardcover first edition, but the third reprint. The popularity of this book is apparent, since it is, as of 2019, in its 5th edition. For my needs this is more than enough and I actually like the font styles and presentation of the books of this era. They tended to be very discrete and semi-scientific in a way that appeals to the average reader.
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