The Diamonds in Colors.
The world's first diamond grading system dates back to the sixth century in India. The system is based on the old class structure of the country. Members of different levels of state, or castes, were allowed to own and use only diamonds of a specific color. Therefore, diamonds serve as a rank badge. The priests and rulers, the brahmins, are allowed to possess diamonds that were "whiter than the shell, the lotus flower, or the rock crystal" (from white to colorless). The owners and warriors were assigned diamonds that were "the brown color of the hare's eye." The merchant class was allowed to own only the diamonds that were the "pretty shadow of a petal of a kadl [flowers]" (yellow ). And members of the lower classes were assigned with diamonds "the burnished glitter of a sword" (gray or black). Kings, however, were free to own diamonds of any color. The systems of classification of diamonds of color have evolved much since then. Today, there are well-established methods for judging the color of the diamond based on much more than compared to shells, rabbit eyes, and flower petals. And the only restrictions on the possession of different colors are based on availability and affordability. While luxury colored diamonds have traditionally been a small part of the diamonds business, their popularity and availability have grown in recent decades. In the 1980s the Argyle mine in Australia began to market its brown colored stones with the trade names such as "Champagne" and "Cognac." Argyle achieved his goal of publicizing the blackberry fancy colored diamonds and let Falling your marketing campaign in the late 1990s. Today, the Argyle mine still produces brown diamonds, but it is famous blackberries as the world's foremost source of rare pink diamonds. Pink and violet rare diamonds. These rare pink and violet diamonds are a small but important part of the production of the Rio Tinto Argyle diamond mine The best known historical and current sources of luxury colored diamonds are India, South Africa and Australia. Other diamond mine sites, such as Brazil, Venezuela, Guyana, and Indonesia, also produces luxury colored diamonds. Source: GIA Photos: Courtesy of Rio Tinto diamonds