History of the cultural formation of mankindis inextricably linked with his ability to process stones. At first it was silicon, which gave not only magnificent weapons, but also fire, and then - various precious minerals on which a man honed his skill in creating beautiful works of art.
And the falcon eye stones belong just tothe latest variety. They had a strong enough influence on the cultural development of many peoples. This is a semi-precious variety of quartz. Mineral, which is almost the most common on the planet.
It is blue, blue-black, blue, and alsooccurs in the form of a special mottled variety, which is sometimes called the "cat's eye." This variety is due to its unusual kind of interspersed crocodile.
In general, color variations are very numerous:you can see the stones as beige, and dark gray. At the same time, the darkest variants are of the greatest value, since they are considered to be more ancient.
Despite the relative transparency, the materialall the same pretty muddy. Very attractive is the "eye" of the green color, in which the combination of translucence and exquisite coloring gives a particularly strong impression.
Similar material, but even more pronouncedtransverse pattern, is called the zebra eye. Thus, the materials that are basically the same are known to people under different names. So, the falcon eye stones have dozens of variations.
Its origin is interesting. All stones of this kind are formed due to the silicification (i.e., silica substitution) of the riebeckite mineral, which retains its structure.
By the way, the term "crocodilite" is often called the remnants of riebekita, which in one or another quantity contains all the stones of the falcon eye.
The bulk of the deposits are located in the SouthAmerica, although there is evidence of mining in the United States. This mineral is quite rare. Synthetic way to get it too expensive, but it is often possible to see glass imitations.
The beauty and value of natural stone is largely determined by its iridescent nature.
Very rare there are extremely expensive samples, which at first sight no one distinguishes from natural amber. Their core is beautifully permeated with bright reddish veins of crocodile.
Fortunately, we know almost everythingunique falcon eye stones, extracted from ancient times. So, the most valuable and famous of them is today in England. A stone weighing 62.3 g was donated to the United Kingdom in 1886. Before that, the king of one of the states of Sri Lanka owned him, which at one time was captured by the same Englishmen.
In addition, a large falcon's stone (photosome of them are in the article) could be found in almost every tribe of the Indians of South America, as this mineral was from time immemorial endowed with mystical properties.
