Green onyx and green aventurine

Two greens: one lit through, one flecked with mica.

Green onyx comes up the strand as a row of small bottle-green windows. Translucent, even in color from bead to bead, the facets throwing light back in flat little planes. Green aventurine beside it is the quieter one. Opaque medium green, softer at the edges, with tiny flakes of mica that catch and let go as the strand turns. Makers reach for onyx when they want emerald color in a big shape. They reach for aventurine when they want green that reads like stone.

Where it comes from

Onyx proper is a banded variety of agate. It is a silicate mineral, and in proper usage the name describes the color pattern, light bands alternating with dark. Roman carvers cut it into cameos. One of them survives well: the Gemma Claudia, a five-layered onyx cameo made around the year 49, now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum. The name has traveled loosely ever since. It has been applied to parallel-banded alabaster and marble, and to calcite and obsidian and opal as well. Aventurine has a shorter record. It is quartzite crowded with fuchsite, a chromium-rich mica that gives both the green and the faint glitter, and much of the bead material is Indian. Its name comes from the Italian a ventura, by chance, after a copper-flecked glass first made by accident in Italy in the early 18th century. Our strands are cut in Jaipur, India. We choose them one at a time in Cupertino, California.

What tradition says

Few stones carry as much gloom in old writing as onyx. The lore around it is full of negative associations. It has been linked with quarrels and with bad dreams, and people have long looked for ways to offset what they believed it carried. Worn in jewelry for millennia all the same. Green aventurine sits at the other end of that ledger. Tradition calls it the gambler's luck stone, and that is the name it still travels under in crystal folklore. Belief rather than fact. Still worth knowing when someone asks what the green is supposed to mean. The Italian root of the name says as much: by chance.

These are beliefs people have held about the stone, told as tradition. They are not claims, and not advice.

How makers use it

Green onyx earns its keep in statement shapes. Marquise and kite move fastest, since long facets stretch the color and it reads as emerald green from across a room. We stock marquise from 11x15mm up to 10x25mm. Pear too, when a softer outline suits the piece. A strong strand is even bottle green from bead to bead and clearly translucent held up to a window. Thirteen green onyx strands are online now. Green aventurine we carry in faceted pear and marquise, for lucky-green bracelets and men's malas. Those strands are not online yet.

Looking after it

At 6.5 to 7 on the Mohs scale, both are fine for bracelets and daily wear. Wash in warm water with mild soap. Dry the beads and the thread all the way through. Keep them off harder stones in a shared pouch, and put jewelry on after lotion and scent rather than before.

Sources: Onyx - Wikipedia, Onyx Symbolism and Legends - International Gem Society, Aventurine: A translucent quartz with a sparkle of mica, Aventurine: The gemstone aventurine information and pictures · Minerals.net