Carnelian, sometimes spelled cornelian (other variants of the name include Sadoine, Mecca stone, and Pigeon's Blood Agate), is a red or reddish-brown variant of chalcedony. It is opaque or translucent to transparent light orange to deep brownish rust red, often found with some white color. The brownish red variety is also known as sard. Hence the name sardonyx is applied to color banded dark carnelian.

The word carnelian is derived from the Latin word meaning horn, in reference to the flesh color sometimes exhibited. Carnelian is said to be a motivation stone and some have called it the "self-esteem stone". Certainly, gemstone beads of carnelian would give the wearer better self-esteem just by their beauty alone. Carnelian has the interesting property that hot wax does not stick to it, that is why it was used widely during Roman times 2,000 years before the present era to make signet or seal rings for imprinting a security seal with wax on correspondence or other important documents.

The mineral is found worldwide, but India is reputed for developing the best gemstones. Other significant sources include Brazil and Uruguay. In jewelry making it is most often cut into either beads or cabochons, but occasionally it is carved. The carnelian beads are made by heating and shaping agate several times, resulting in a change of color. The resultant beads are drilled with a stone drill. Some beads are over 12 centimeters in length. Today, the entire process is the work of professional craftsmen whose technology has been handed down from generation to generation. On the picture - wax carved carnelian seal on an envelope.

Olga Dillow is a bead artist of a Russian origin. She lives with her husband and her daughter in Renton, WA. She has been beading just for a few years, but has been very successful. When she started doing beadwork, Olga learned a variety of techniques, and now she makes beaded jewelry, Easter eggs , toys, flowers and trees. Recently she experimented with embroidery on canvas using seed beads, and now creates the whole beaded pictures with them. If you are interested in Olga Dillow's beadwork, please contact us at any time at info@mylovelybeads.com.

Some of the gem names are very confusing. All of us have heard about cat's eye. The natural cat's eye is a translucent yellowish chatoyant chrysoberyl (sometimes is is called cymophane), this variety of chrysoberyl exhibits pleasing chatoyant or opalescence that reminds one of an eye of a cat. Some sellers call cat's eye any of a variety of gems, such as some forms of chalcedony, that are chatoyant when cut in a rounded shape. But there is one more cat's eye - manmade glass that reflects light in a way reminiscent of a cat's eye, and this gem can be pink, blue, green, black - of almost any possible color!

Another example is aventurine. Natural aventurine is a shimmering quartz stone that ranges in color from yellow to red to light green to blue to light brown. The shimmer is caused by tiny metallic particles within the stone. Because of golden glitter aventurine is sometimes also called goldstone. Another aventurine is a shimmering glass with golden glitter due to copper crystals suspended in or pressed into the surface of other materials, this gem is manmade and is usually bright brown to almost black.