Book Review by Gabriela Lee
The brilliant, shape-shifting cut of the perfect diamond has been known to send men (and the occasional woman) to descend into a kind of madness, where family and future can be haphazardly thrown aside in the hopes of obtaining a fabled jewel. Amber, the softest gemstone, was once worth more than the weight of gold. The rarity of opals during the Roman period had caused the exile of a member of the Senate during Mark Anthony's reign. Throughout history, civilizations rose and fell, wars were fought, and treatises were signed, because of gemstones - these beautiful mineral fragments created by random collusions of time and circumstance that have captivated mankind for eons.
Buried Treasure: Travels Through the Jewellery Box, Victoria Finlay's follow-up collection to her well-received first book, Colour: Travels Through the Paint Box, explores the ties between people and jewels, and how these pretty colored stones have influenced the decisions of kings and queens, highlighted the greed of corporations and businesses, and dramatized the hopes and stories of the individuals who have spent their lives immersed in the search for the best gemstone of their trade.
Divided into sections that follow the Mohs scale of determining the hardness of matter, the book covers nine gemstones and their stories. Sometimes playing the historian, other times the investigative journalist, Finlay records with remarkable accuracy the journeys of different men and women, living and dead, that have pushed the history of these various jewels forward. She emphasizes their significance over the centuries, and the importance of preserving the authenticity of a gemstone. In a market where synthetics are quickly taking over the real thing, jewelers are scrambling to regain a foothold into one of the world's oldest - and one of the most lucrative - businesses.
Finlay's book presents a vivid study of a secret culture that highlights the precious stories behind these precious stones. Her style, both accessible and informative, covers both the historical significance as well as the present-day struggle for jewelers and the industry of gemstones. For example, she writes about jet: "Mourning was already a significant part of life in Victorian England. However, when the Queen's beloved consort died, mourning became a national pastime - and after the Queen adopted Whitby jet as her mourning adornment, it became the height of fashion." Her careful balance of history, society, and the impact of the gemstone is skillfully woven together in a manner that is easily understandable and yet presents layers of meaning that is akin to mining for precious stones.
She tracks the movement of artisans from a sociological standpoint and examines the impact of the particular jewel anywhere from the environment (as with the case of the Scottish river mussels, which are now protected by the government after rampant weekend mussel-catchers decided to push their luck by prying open thousands of river mussels without respect for the delicate balance of the river ecosystem, bringing them to the brink of extinction during the 1960s), to politics (amber was considered a diplomatic gift in Europe during the 1700s, and kings were presented with amber-wrought presents from other heads of state as a sign of respect), to the plight of gemstone workers (in the 1880s, diamond workers in the Kimbereley mines in South Africa were employed under the worst circumstances, culminating in a landslide that killed over 200 people. Reports say that the last thing rescuers heard were hymns being sung beneath the round as the workers prepared for their death).
Buried Treasure is a refreshing and exciting way to examine the world through the eyes of precious stones, where the reader is given the chance to unearth the myriad connections between a handful of jewels, the entire human civilization, and the brilliant colors and cuts of the lives that were intertwined with the stories of these beautiful stones.
(Buried Treasure: Travels Through the Jewellery Box by Victoria Finlay. Non-fiction, published by Scepter Books, 2006. Available at Fully Booked.)
