The necklaces were entombed with their mummified bodies as valuable goods for the afterlife. Red garnets have a long history, but modern gem buyers can pick from a rich palette of garnet colors Greens, oranges, pinkish oranges, deeply saturated purplish reds, and even some blues. There are more than twenty garnet categories, called species, but only five are commercially important as gems Those five are pyrope, almandine (also called almandite), spessartine, grossular (grossularite), and andradite. The first thing a buyer of garnets needs to be aware of is the wide variety of garnet types
At first, the sheer number of garnet varieties can seem bewildering. Garnets have fair to good toughness, making them durable enough for all jewelry styles as long as they are treated with the proper care Garnets should not be subjected to any hard blows or rough wear Depending on type, garnet hardness ranges from 6.5 to 7.5 on the mohs scale. This case demonstrates that sophisticated chemical analysis of garnet should be practiced routinely in gemological laboratories to make sure unique garnets are not misidentified. This bibliography has been prepared as an aid for people interested in garnet
