Ammolite Fossil Opalizing ~ Gemstone Necklace ~ incl. 925 Sterling Silver Eyelet + 304 Stainless Steel Chain
A brand new acquisition & proud creation of mine for you ~ an Ammolite stone, an absolute dream stone, very rare and magical.
Age of the stone: approx. 70 - 75 million years
Overall pendant length (with eyelet): 30mm
Dimensions of the stone: 20 x 12 mm
Chain length: 50cm
About the history of Ammolites:
Ammolite is a rare opalizing gemstone. It is mainly found on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains and consists of the fossilized remains of ammonites. Ammolite is also offered under the trade names Calcentin or Korit. In the languages of the indigenous Blackfoot Indian tribes, the stone is called Aapoak (small, crawling stone in the Kainai language due to the play of colors) or Iniskim ("buffalo stone").
During the Cretaceous period, a large subtropical inland sea, the Western Interior Seaway, was located in North America. Due to continental drift, the younger part of the Rocky Mountains folded up, while the sea gradually disappeared. In this warm sea, among others, the ammonites Placenticeras meeki and Placenticeras intercalare and more rarely Baculites compressus lived.
After their death, their shells sank to the seabed and were covered by clay (bentonite). In these bentonite sediment layers, the ammonites were largely crushed, but the shells remained intact. These shells partly consisted of mother-of-pearl, i.e., fine platelet-like aragonite crystals embedded in a protein matrix.
In most fossilized shells, the aragonite was dissolved because it is more soluble than, for example, calcite in the surrounding rock. The resulting cavities were later often filled with other material such as calcite or, more rarely, pyrite, or remained hollow. At temperatures above 400 °C, the less stable aragonite transformed into the more stable calcite. Therefore, fossils with preserved aragonite are particularly rare.
In the ammonite shells from which ammolite originated, however, the process was somewhat different. The aragonite remained preserved, mainly due to the covering by waterproof volcanic ash from eruptions of the volcanoes of the forming Rocky Mountains. At the same time, the ammonite-bearing layers did not reach too great depths, so they did not heat up above 400 °C. During diagenesis, trace elements such as iron and magnesium migrated into the shells.
Only rarely are completely well-preserved ammonites found where the suture lines are still visible. Ammonites up to 90 cm in size have been found, but usually, the opalizing ammonites are much smaller.
Properties
Ammolite consists mainly of aragonite, which comes directly from the original mother-of-pearl in the ammonite shells. Besides aragonite, calcite, quartzite, pyrite, and other minerals occur in variable proportions. The shell itself contains a number of trace elements (aluminum, barium, chromium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, strontium, titanium, and vanadium).
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"A stone is the condensed history of the universe"
~Art of Nature Berlin~
