Innovative Color Enhancement

(via Gem Scoup) Simon Bruce Lockhart writes:

Like any county, and particularly like those who population sometimes sees a disproportionate amount of disadvantaged civilians, Sri Lanka enjoys its fair share of friendly, open, and utterly charming confidence tricksters. Innovative local ‘color enhancement techniques’ are employed on yellow and blue sapphires to obtain high prices. The wily rascals of Elahera roll rough sapphires around in simple carbon paper. The deep blue carbon rubs off on the rough gem yielding an ‘improved’ coloration, which exhibits top cornflower blues worth a fortune. However this trick can literally come apart in your hands as the blue carbon rubs off the gem and onto your fingers.

Another ‘color enhancement’ trick unique to Sri Lanka enhances yellow sapphires by use of a well-known indigenous tree called the ‘Goraka Tree’. Known for possessing a saffron-yellow resin, a hole is gouged into the soft three trunk and a less than honest dealer presses a pale sapphire into the tree, leaving it there for several days. After wiping clean, the whole gem is stained a rich and vivid yellow color that is extremely convincing—until cut. While practices such as these are deplorable, one can’t help being impressed with the ingenuity of these somewhat creative conmen.