kenb
Bronze Member
30 August 2007
WORLD'S LARGEST DIAMOND
Clawed from the dirt of an African mine, an unremarkable green rock the size of a coconut which could be worth tens of millions of pounds
By Brian Mciver
THEY ARE the sparkling little gems that can be a girl's best friend and are supposed to last forever.
But the world of diamonds could be turned on its head if a new discovery of a monster gemstone is confirmed.
Miners in South Africa claim to have uncovered the biggest diamond of all time - a mammoth 7000-carat stone.
The gem is reported to be about the size of a coconut and it has been estimated that it could fetch more than £15million.
The discovery was made in the North-West Province of South Africa and the stone is now under lock and key in a bank vault awaiting tests to prove whether it is actually a diamond or just a crystal gemstone.
The unidentified stone has been described by a leading diamond expert as being as remarkable as the Mona Lisa or finding the Loch Ness Monster.
It would certainly be the biggest uncut diamond ever found if it is verified.
The current record-holder is the Cullinan diamond, which was discovered near Pretoria in 1905.
It weighed in at more than 3000 carats and yielded nine major stones and 96 smaller brilliant-cut gems.
The biggest, known as the Star of Africa, was for many years the largest cut diamond in the world, weighing in at 530.20 carats. It forms part of the royal sceptre in the British Crown Jewels.
Property developer Brett Jolly, a shareholder in the mine which unearthed the new find, is stunned at the potential of his firm's discovery. He said: "You just don't expect this kind of thing to happen.
"I was very sceptical but as the day went on and I received the picture, I believe it is real."
The only picture of the rough gem so far released is a grainy image showing a green tinted stone. Its composition, and consequently its worth, will only be known when the testing process is complete.
Les Milner, of the Jewellery Council of South Africa Diamond Grading Laboratory, is one of the world's foremost experts in the testing of precious stones.
He said if it is proven, the new find is an extraordinary discovery.
His lab in Johannesburg tests between 200 and 300 stones a day and he says it is a relatively straightforward procedure to test the worth of the gem.
He added: "We don't know what it is yet, so we call it a stone. Something this size is very, very unusual. The biggest stone I've ever seen is 80 carats.
"The first process is to have someone identify that it is a diamond. The owners of the stone have stated they will have it tested by independent diamond experts.
"At this moment, we don't know if it is a diamond but the first thing they will do is find out if it is a diamond.
"If it is, it can be polished and cut into various stones, depending on the make-up of the stone.
"They say it is 7000-8000 carats. Only once you've seen it, depending on its characteristics, can you decide how best to polish it and cut it - whether you want one massive stone, or two stones or even two big ones and 40 small ones.
"It just depends on the shape of it."
Tom Tweedy, spokesman for De Beers, the world's largest producer of diamonds, said they were aware of the news of the find but were waiting for confirmation.
"If it is a diamond, good luck to him," he said.
Les Milner said that it was impossible to put a price on the stone if it turned out to be a diamond.
He said: "Nothing that massive has ever been found anywhere. The biggest stone ever was in Cullinan but this is a little bit bigger.
"If I had the stone, I could tell you in 10-15 minutes whether it really was a diamond or not. It's not a particularly lengthy process and it is pretty straight-forward.
"You don't need to be a rocket scientist, just have some simple instruments, a microscope and a knowledge of diamonds.
"You just use a microscope to check on its inclusions and then do a thermal conductivity test to see if it conducts heat, which a diamond does, and measure the specific gravity of the stone."
HEADDED: "To polish and cut a diamond, you use diamond dust or diamond powder. That's how you cut diamonds, with another diamond.
"You cut it using a saw impregnated with diamond dust and you take a hammer, and a little piece of diamond, to cut it into shape."
He added that the value would be hard to determine: "I've heard so many figures thrown around, £16million or £20million.
"But there's no such price for something like this, it's like the Mona Lisa, what price do you put on that? It depends on what someone is willing to pay for it.
"I'm sure there would be a bidding war. It could be a rich investor or a big diamond company in Antwerp or New York.
"A diamond of this size would be the eighth wonder of the world and finding it is like finding the Loch Ness Monster."
The biggest gem-quality cut diamond known is the Golden Jubilee, a 545-carat diamond, cut from a 755-carat stone found in South Africa.
Other previous big finds are the 273-carat Centenary Diamond, unveiled in 1991 by De Beers and taken from a rough stone of 599 carats and the Millennium Star at 203 carats, which came from a rough diamond weighing 777 carats found in Zaire in 1990.
Another legendary gem which forms part of Britain's Crown Jewels is the 105-carat Koh-i-Noor diamond, from Andra Pradesh in India.
It is famous for being fought over for centuries in India and was presented to Queen Victoria in 1877 when she was proclaimed Empress of India.
The biggest diamond ever discovered is beyond the reach of the Earth's diamond miners, though.
The BPM 37093, nicknamed the Lucy Diamond, is 2500 miles in diameter and is floating through space 50 light years away in the Centaurus solar system.
It weighs in at a modest 10 billion trillion trillion carats.
Diamonds were first discovered in the Indian sub-continent more than 3000 years ago. But archaeologists have found evidence of them in China 5000 years ago.
Large deposits of diamond are found in India, Brazil, Australia, Russia and Canada.
But the mines in Africa, which have operated since the 1800s, produce 65 per cent of all the world's diamonds.
Around 26,000 kg (130 million carats) of diamonds are mined a year around the world, with most processed through the world's diamond capital, Antwerp in Belgium, and sold in New York.
While diamonds are the most precious stones in the world, they have also been one of the most controversial, due to the "conflict diamond" ethical trading issue.
The stones, also known as blood or rebel diamonds as shown in the 2006 Leonardo di Caprio film Blood Diamond, are those which have been mined and traded by warring factions who used the profits to fund their brutal campaigns.
In the early 90s, it was estimated four per cent of the world trade was made up by conflict diamonds.
But the legitimate industry has worked hard to eliminate the trade by bringing in the Kimberley Process.
The process tracks diamonds from mine to shop display to ensure they are of a peaceful and legitimate origin and since 2003 the system has helped ensure that now more than 99 per cent of all stones traded are conflict free.
Nelson Mandela once said: "The diamond industry is vital to the Southern African economy", and the legitimate trade in African diamonds is now one of the biggest legal and regulated income streams for many poor African states.
It has been estimated that five million people have access to health care in the developing world thanks to the income from diamonds, while 10 million people are employed in various stages of the diamond industry.
'If this is real, it will be the Mona Lisa or the Loch Ness Monster of the diamond world'
kenb
WORLD'S LARGEST DIAMOND
Clawed from the dirt of an African mine, an unremarkable green rock the size of a coconut which could be worth tens of millions of pounds
By Brian Mciver
THEY ARE the sparkling little gems that can be a girl's best friend and are supposed to last forever.
But the world of diamonds could be turned on its head if a new discovery of a monster gemstone is confirmed.
Miners in South Africa claim to have uncovered the biggest diamond of all time - a mammoth 7000-carat stone.
The gem is reported to be about the size of a coconut and it has been estimated that it could fetch more than £15million.
The discovery was made in the North-West Province of South Africa and the stone is now under lock and key in a bank vault awaiting tests to prove whether it is actually a diamond or just a crystal gemstone.
The unidentified stone has been described by a leading diamond expert as being as remarkable as the Mona Lisa or finding the Loch Ness Monster.
It would certainly be the biggest uncut diamond ever found if it is verified.
The current record-holder is the Cullinan diamond, which was discovered near Pretoria in 1905.
It weighed in at more than 3000 carats and yielded nine major stones and 96 smaller brilliant-cut gems.
The biggest, known as the Star of Africa, was for many years the largest cut diamond in the world, weighing in at 530.20 carats. It forms part of the royal sceptre in the British Crown Jewels.
Property developer Brett Jolly, a shareholder in the mine which unearthed the new find, is stunned at the potential of his firm's discovery. He said: "You just don't expect this kind of thing to happen.
"I was very sceptical but as the day went on and I received the picture, I believe it is real."
The only picture of the rough gem so far released is a grainy image showing a green tinted stone. Its composition, and consequently its worth, will only be known when the testing process is complete.
Les Milner, of the Jewellery Council of South Africa Diamond Grading Laboratory, is one of the world's foremost experts in the testing of precious stones.
He said if it is proven, the new find is an extraordinary discovery.
His lab in Johannesburg tests between 200 and 300 stones a day and he says it is a relatively straightforward procedure to test the worth of the gem.
He added: "We don't know what it is yet, so we call it a stone. Something this size is very, very unusual. The biggest stone I've ever seen is 80 carats.
"The first process is to have someone identify that it is a diamond. The owners of the stone have stated they will have it tested by independent diamond experts.
"At this moment, we don't know if it is a diamond but the first thing they will do is find out if it is a diamond.
"If it is, it can be polished and cut into various stones, depending on the make-up of the stone.
"They say it is 7000-8000 carats. Only once you've seen it, depending on its characteristics, can you decide how best to polish it and cut it - whether you want one massive stone, or two stones or even two big ones and 40 small ones.
"It just depends on the shape of it."
Tom Tweedy, spokesman for De Beers, the world's largest producer of diamonds, said they were aware of the news of the find but were waiting for confirmation.
"If it is a diamond, good luck to him," he said.
Les Milner said that it was impossible to put a price on the stone if it turned out to be a diamond.
He said: "Nothing that massive has ever been found anywhere. The biggest stone ever was in Cullinan but this is a little bit bigger.
"If I had the stone, I could tell you in 10-15 minutes whether it really was a diamond or not. It's not a particularly lengthy process and it is pretty straight-forward.
"You don't need to be a rocket scientist, just have some simple instruments, a microscope and a knowledge of diamonds.
"You just use a microscope to check on its inclusions and then do a thermal conductivity test to see if it conducts heat, which a diamond does, and measure the specific gravity of the stone."
HEADDED: "To polish and cut a diamond, you use diamond dust or diamond powder. That's how you cut diamonds, with another diamond.
"You cut it using a saw impregnated with diamond dust and you take a hammer, and a little piece of diamond, to cut it into shape."
He added that the value would be hard to determine: "I've heard so many figures thrown around, £16million or £20million.
"But there's no such price for something like this, it's like the Mona Lisa, what price do you put on that? It depends on what someone is willing to pay for it.
"I'm sure there would be a bidding war. It could be a rich investor or a big diamond company in Antwerp or New York.
"A diamond of this size would be the eighth wonder of the world and finding it is like finding the Loch Ness Monster."
The biggest gem-quality cut diamond known is the Golden Jubilee, a 545-carat diamond, cut from a 755-carat stone found in South Africa.
Other previous big finds are the 273-carat Centenary Diamond, unveiled in 1991 by De Beers and taken from a rough stone of 599 carats and the Millennium Star at 203 carats, which came from a rough diamond weighing 777 carats found in Zaire in 1990.
Another legendary gem which forms part of Britain's Crown Jewels is the 105-carat Koh-i-Noor diamond, from Andra Pradesh in India.
It is famous for being fought over for centuries in India and was presented to Queen Victoria in 1877 when she was proclaimed Empress of India.
The biggest diamond ever discovered is beyond the reach of the Earth's diamond miners, though.
The BPM 37093, nicknamed the Lucy Diamond, is 2500 miles in diameter and is floating through space 50 light years away in the Centaurus solar system.
It weighs in at a modest 10 billion trillion trillion carats.
Diamonds were first discovered in the Indian sub-continent more than 3000 years ago. But archaeologists have found evidence of them in China 5000 years ago.
Large deposits of diamond are found in India, Brazil, Australia, Russia and Canada.
But the mines in Africa, which have operated since the 1800s, produce 65 per cent of all the world's diamonds.
Around 26,000 kg (130 million carats) of diamonds are mined a year around the world, with most processed through the world's diamond capital, Antwerp in Belgium, and sold in New York.
While diamonds are the most precious stones in the world, they have also been one of the most controversial, due to the "conflict diamond" ethical trading issue.
The stones, also known as blood or rebel diamonds as shown in the 2006 Leonardo di Caprio film Blood Diamond, are those which have been mined and traded by warring factions who used the profits to fund their brutal campaigns.
In the early 90s, it was estimated four per cent of the world trade was made up by conflict diamonds.
But the legitimate industry has worked hard to eliminate the trade by bringing in the Kimberley Process.
The process tracks diamonds from mine to shop display to ensure they are of a peaceful and legitimate origin and since 2003 the system has helped ensure that now more than 99 per cent of all stones traded are conflict free.
Nelson Mandela once said: "The diamond industry is vital to the Southern African economy", and the legitimate trade in African diamonds is now one of the biggest legal and regulated income streams for many poor African states.
It has been estimated that five million people have access to health care in the developing world thanks to the income from diamonds, while 10 million people are employed in various stages of the diamond industry.
'If this is real, it will be the Mona Lisa or the Loch Ness Monster of the diamond world'
kenb
