3 years, 2 months ago-
Posts
-
Fellow USFG Members,
As the newly appointed USFG Historian, I would like to introduce a history related challenge.
I am challenging all members to identify the “Oldest Documented Gem Design” they can find in any historical record. The goal of this challenge is to develop a story for the newsletter, which will result in the re-design of several of the oldest gem designs into GemCad format, such that he “winners” can be shared with the entire USFG faceting community. I will start off with an example, then I challenge anyone to beat the latest design. Any earlier design should contain as much info as can be found; Name of design, the designer, source location, known age of design, facet angles, etc. (Not just a picture/line drawing)
Lets start by saying that until the end of March, for the next 5 weeks, you can’t beat the latest entry by any more than 100 years, then, in April, we can go as early as possible. Let’s try and complete this challenge by the end of April, OK? The winning 3 entries will get their names included in the next newsletter.
Share this challenge with all your friends and fellow faceters, please. Let’s get some fun in the history of gem cutting!
I will include my beginning entry, which should be easy to beat, at first.
Jeff Theesfeld
Design 29-2, October 1967
Long and Steel?
Seattle Facetor Design Newsletters, 1967
USFG Link from Library…look up top of this page.https://usfacetersguild.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/October-1967-Design-29-2.pdf
Jeff Theesfeld:
Come On….You guys and gals can beat this easily!!!!!You may find the recent aticle from the International Gem Society site. The artical is the History of Lapidary and was written by Dr. Gerald Wykoff.
He shows a progression from
point cut
table cut
Old Single cut
Sancy Cut
Apex Cut
Rose Cut
Mazarin cut.
Old European cutI don’t know what you expect, but the oldest designs seem very simple. and probably evolved from the crystal shape of a diamond. The crude methods available for cutting and shaping were so labor intensive that cutters wanted to remove a minimum material.
Also, there doesn’t seem to be much documentation until the 1400’s. When a Louis de Berquen developed technology and the “Sancy design”. This seems to have been a critical design where break facets and the design of the pavillion became important.
This history is really the story of diamond cutting. Not much attention is paid to colored stones. I don’t know if there is a separate evolution for colored gems or not.
I’m cutting replicas (from clear quartz) which has already lead to some unexpected results due to the large difference in diffraction.
There is a story here, and a lot to be learned, but, I am not sure of what you expect to see.
Prior to the 1400s, the designs were highly proprietary and undocumented to avoid competition. You are going to have a problem going further back than the “Sancy design”. If some of the Jewish gem cutters created notebooks that were passed down and now published, you might go back into Spain a bit older. Does anyone know of these types or records?
Dennis Anderson in sunny Southern California
There are many available books and articles about the history of faceting. Very few of these resources give actual, cuttable gem designs. That is, they lack detail like index settings, degrees, and a history of who designed the actual gem. That is the sort of history I am challenging people to find.
For example, I would like people to research and find where the original design for the Sancy exists, not just that the Sancy design does exist. Where is the source for how to cut the Sancy? How old is it, who designed it, etc. That is the challenge.
A few more hints; http://www.facetdiagrams.org What is the oldest design in that collection? What is the oldest design in Robert Long’s notebooks? What is the oldest documented Marcel Tolkowsky design and when was the SRB design available? Is the design for the Florentine available? Are any of the designs from Jean-Baptist Tavernier’s Travels in India available, like the Great Mogul, or the Tavernier Blue?
Actual cuttable gem designs are what I am looking for in this challenge. What is the oldest? Good luck!When republishing any old faceting diagrams which have previously been published within the last 120 years, IMO we (the USFG) should be mindful of copyrights.
Larry Cashatt
Great idea! I don’t have any historic designs to offer but am recently intrigued by faceting history and will be following this post as well as looking forward to the newsletter article.
Not sure if this is what you are looking for but there is an article in the November 1961 Lapidary Journal called “How to Cut the Sancy Replica” There was a series from April 1960 through November 1963 on how to cut replicas of many famous diamonds.
This is the listing that I have compiled to date. 🙂
Number Article Name Date Page
1 How to Cut the Cullinan I Replica 1960 – April 38
2
3
4
5
6
7 How to Cut the Florentine Replica 1961- Apr
8
9 How to Cut the Sancy Replica 1961 – Nov 452
10 How to Cut the Cullinan II Replica 1961 – Dec 566
11 How to Cut the Nassak Replica 1962 – Feb 610
12 How to Cut the Dresden Green Replica 1962 – Apr
13 How to Cut the Cullinan VI Replica 1962 – May 260
14 How to Cut the Star of the South Replica 1962 – Jun 359
15 How to Cut the Orloff Replica 1962 – July 442
16 How to Cut the Empress Eugenie Replica 1962 – Aug 492
17 How to Cut the “English Dresden” Replica 1962 – Sep 582
18 How to Cut the “Cullinan III” Replica 1962 – Oct 678
19 How to Cut the “Stewart” Replica 1962 – Nov 780
20 How to Cut the “Pasha of Egypt” Replica 1962 – Dec 880
21 How to Cut the “Jonker” Replica 1963 – Jan 946
22 How to Cut the “Piggot” Replica 1963 – Feb 1032
23 How to Cut the “Tiffany” Replica 1963 – March 1130
24 How to Cut the “Victoria” Replica 1963 – April 14
25 How to Cut the “Cullinan V” Replica 1963 – May 302
26 How to Cut the “Polar Star” Replica 1963 – Jun 378
27 How to Cut the “Shah” Replica 1963 – July 471
28 How to cut the “Cullinan IV” Replica 1963 – August 539
29 How to cut the “Cullinan VII” Replica 1963 – September 651
30 How to cut the “Cullinan VIII” Replica 1963 – October 716
31 How to cut the “Cullinan IX” Replica 1963 – October 717
32 How to Cut the “Dudley” Replica 1963 – November 824Do you have a link, or a copy of this Sancy replica design from 1961? Even older would be the Cullinan I from April 1960, right? If so, could you share this?
Is there anywhere online where these old Lapidary Journals can be found?
The effort in exploring and locating old designs is the treasure of this challenge.
Unfortunately I have not been able to find them online, likely due to copyright concerns. I have been collecting old issues of lapidary magazines for some time and recently have been scanning them into PDF format for my personal and educational use. This also has the added benefit of reducing the fire hazard from all the old paper. 🙂
I will extract the pages of the article and attach for you to use for educational purposes.
Thanks,
Mike
This is the oldest design identified so far.
Cullinan I Replica, from Lapidary Journal, April 1960
See above attachmentSo here is a fun one. If you look into http://www.facetdiagrams.org, and you narrow your search by year, I think you will see that the oldest design found, is a design listed from 1944. It is 01.229, Goldstein Round. The design itself states that it was from “Goldstein, Edward; Off P Gazette, 1 Feb 44, p160” The Off P Gazette is short for Official Gazette for Patents, and if you follow the link provided and go to page 160, you will see this design.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.89047003603;view=1up;seq=172
So if this counts for 01, Feb 1944, that would be the oldest yet. It is actually fun to search for older faceting designs on this Off P Gazette website. I’ll bet there were some very interesting historical events surrounding early facet designs, and their patents. I’ll count this design because I know of several older designs, and I still challenge USFG members to search for older designs.Hi JTheesfeld. I just saw this thread and it perked my interest because I have been going through old faceting designs from the Renaissance times and making gem cad diagrams of them. Some of them are really really interesting and complex. I’m not ready to share any yet because I plan to publish them in a book I’m working on about the history of colored stone faceting. I recommend checking out this book if you can find it in a library. It has lots of drawings of renaissance stones:
https://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Cuts-Historic-Jewellery-1381-1910/dp/1874044074/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1519968259&sr=8-1&keywords=diamond+cuts+in+historic+jewelryI recently purchased the first 10 years of lapidary journal and I scanned the first issue and uploaded it for all to see. I have a website going called http://www.facetinghistory.com and you can find it in the Resources section.
Unfortunately they don’t post any diagrams until 1949 but I have uploaded that one here for you. Eventually I would like to digitize my whole collection to PDF to share online but that will take a long time !
Also let me know if you find any interesting stuff as historian or if you need and help or suggestion. I am full of them and happy to meet another historian!
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.