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 Onyx
is a semi-precious stone that is black and white, generally arranged in layers.
It is a form of agate with parallel banding. This structure lends itself to
cameo making. Onyx is a species of chalcedony (microcrystalline quartz). In
jewellery design as in fashion, colours look crisper against a background of
black, and black and white always looks right. In fine jewellery, the black
backdrop is often supplied by onyx, a chalcedony quartz with a fine texture and
black colour.
Onyx was very popular with the ancient Greeks and Romans. The name comes from
the Greek word "onux", which means fingernail. The story is that one day frisky
Cupid cut the divine fingernails of Venus with an arrowhead while she was
sleeping. He left the clippings scattered on the sand and the fates turned them
into stone so that no part of the heavenly body would ever perish. True, black
isn't normally the colour one associates with fingernails. (Did Venus wear
Vamp?) But in Greek times, almost all colours of chalcedony from fingernail
white to dark brown and black were called onyx. Later, the Romans narrowed the
term to refer to black and dark brown colours only.
Black onyx especially shines when used as a backdrop for colour play. Its
fine texture also makes it ideal for carving, making it a favored material for
today's lapidary artists. Onyx was often used as the perfect foil for carved
rock crystal, or the drop dead red of rubies in Art deco designs. It is also
popular in marcasite jewellery. So if you would like to add a little black magic
to your jewellery design, consider onyx.
We have designed and created over 1,300 unique
items of jewellery that we manufacture in house. We are continually designing
and making new items every week and will endeavour to add them here on this site
as soon as we make them, however, we may not have all our designs on our site.
If you are searching for a particular style or type of jewellery item and cannot
find it on this site please contact us as we might
have just what you are looking for or can hand make it for you.
Onyx
Rings: To view a larger photo click the thumbnail. To return to this
page simply click the back button on your web browser. Please note the
photographs are not to scale.
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