Prof Hermann Bank is one the most well known gemologist in the world. He shares the very lessons he had learnt during the past several decades as a teacher and researcher. All opportunities are accompanied by their own challenges. All the available knowledge in the world is accelerating at a phenomenal rate.
Prof Hermann Bank’s Address:
In his address, following the presentation of awards to the Gemmological Association of Great Britain at Goldsmith’s Hall on 14th November, 1983, including candidates from many different parts of the world, Prof Hermann Bank said:
Es war fur mich eine grosse Ehre, nach 7 Jahren wieder von der Gemmological Association of Great Britain eingeladen zu warden, um den erfolgreichen Kandidaten der Diplom-Prufugen des Jahres 1983 ihre Urkunden auszuhandigen. But as in 1976 I think that you would prefer that I try to continue in your language, and I beg you to excuse my poor English.
It was a great honor for me to be invited to present the awards of the Gemmological Association of Great Britain to the successful candidates of 1983, and I thank you very much for this invitation and the friendly welcome. The occasion is particularly pleasing for me for several reasons—(1) it is exactly 30 years since I passed the Diploma Examination in 1953 and became FGA; (2) as you have realized already, my eldest daughter is among you successful candidates; (3) it was pleasant to be able to present the Anderson-Bank Prize this year after Basic Anderson did it last year; (4) one must enjoy such an occasion anyhow. Since I have been asked to address you after having fulfilled my first task, I shall now try to fulfill my second too, and I should like especially to speak to the candidates.
You have now got your diplomas, and we hope that you do not think, as Goethe expressed in his Faust, ‘What you possess black on white you can confidently carry home,’ and relax on your success. It is one your duties to always perfect your gemological education, to keep your knowledge on a high standard, and you must allow me to give you some advice.
Gemology was much easier thirty years ago, and, if students of 1953 such a myself had remained on the level of knowledge of that time, they would now be lost. The developments and the progress have been so enormous in all fields of gemology that it has been necessary for us to learn steadily to keep always up to date.
There have been discovered new minerals. There have been found old minerals worth cutting. There have been invented new synthetic and artificial products. There have been effected new color manipulations, so many irradiations and diffusions and heatings, that it has also been necessary to use new techniques to disclose all these phenomena. Often the techniques must be more and more scientific to get the right results.
For a long time gemology was regarded only as a more commercial and technical appendix of mineralogy. The discovery of new mineral species by gemologists and the necessity of adoption of scientific methods to distinguish between gemstones and their substitutes or their manipulation have brought gemology to the level of a science. Last year the I M A (International Mineral Association) has formed its own commission on gem materials. That means, the I M A has accepted gemology on its own as scientific part of mineralogy. More and more mineralogists are taking an interest in gemological problems and assisting us to solve them, doing research on new minerals and varieties as well as on synthetic and imitation stones, their properties and distinguishing characteristics. Comprehensive information is increasingly important, and jeweler’s customers want more information. Therefore jewelers must have better education to be able to pass the required information on to their interested customers.
The Gemmological Association of Great Britain recognized this demand at the earliest stage and started gemological education courses over fifty years ago, and the courses have become an example and a model for gemological associations in other countries. The title FGA is highly esteemed throughout the world—hence the number of students every year. It is your proud duty to uphold the professional reputation which this title implies.
In the preliminary course the Gemmological Association of Great Britain tried to give the students a general idea, and, in the Diploma course, special theoretical knowledge and practical ability to use the various methods. However, we can only give and receive instruction until the day of the examination. Education combines the knowledge of the past with the unknown dark of the future by using wisely the present.
The candidates of today know—or at least should know—what we knew thirty years ago, and they also know what happened in these thirty years, but they and we do not know what problems will occur in the next thirty years. The unknown dark is spread over the developments of the future.
One fact is certain. New technologies will create new problems, and we can solve these problems only when we study steadily and try to keep on the newest stand of knowledge of the theoretical part and of the practical know-how of the methods.
A poet once said: ‘We must demand the extraordinary from ourselves to be able to do the ordinary.’
This we should at least try to do. If you have the slightest doubt, do not hesitate to consult an experienced colleague. We have a German proverb: ‘Was fur einen vielzuviel, ist fur 2 ein Kinderspiel.’ (What one cannot do is child’s play for two).
Experts are not made in heaven, and it is better to ask than to make an error. ‘Student is, who wants to learn something: Fellow or journey-man is, who knows something: Master is, who devised or invented something.’
Always take enough time to test a stone; never be in a hurry. Take your time also to study the Journal of Gemmology and other sources of information, and try to think, as Goethe expressed it: ‘Do not say, ‘Tomorrow I will do this and that: Do it, and wait until tomorrow and say then ‘I did it,’ which means, ‘Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.’ Mineralogical gemologists and mineralogists try always to find and to develop new scientific equipments and methods which are suitable for easily distinguishing between gemstones and their substitutes, if possible without destroying them (neither gemstones nor substitutes).
Do not think that you only need to know a bit. A little learning is a dang’rous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.’ (Pope: Essay on Criticism, 216). That means that we should try to obtain a thorough and comprehensive, broadly based knowledge.
The old Chinese said: ‘What you hear, you easily forget; What you see, you keep better in mind; Only what you have touched and worked with, you keep forever.’
So, please, use your instruments and get practice. In over ninety-nine percent of cases you can identify a stone by means of our classical gemological instruments—the polariscope, the conoscope, the refractometer, the microscope, the spectroscope, the UV lamp, etc. Only in very few cases is it necessary to consult X-ray powder methods or X-ray fluorescence or even X-ray topography or Tomography, the microprobe, IR spectroscopy or other more scientific equipments. But they are absolutely necessary for basic research and for doubtful cases.
It is not enough to have knowledge, it is necessary to use it.
And it is not enough to be willing, you must also do it.
So do work to get acquainted with methods and with all gemstones and their substitutes. The more you gain practice for yourself, the more you become sure on the one side but the more you also understand the verity of the two words of Socrates: ‘Scio nescio’ (I know what I do not know)
But Goethe consoles us when he writes: ‘It is not important what do know; but that we always have the right idea at the right moment.’
And it also is not correct that you should only buy instruments and textbooks, because often the purchase of a book is mistaken for the appropriation of the contents. So buy, use and read.
Successful candidates, I congratulate you on your Diplomas and I welcome you among the Fellows of the Gemmological Association of Great Britain. I wish you every success in your gemological future.
It is not important that one or the other of you will become a famous gemologist, but it is important that each and every one of you does his or her duty so that your clients have confidence in gemology and gemologists. To merit this confidence, do not remain on your present level of knowledge; study carefully to keep always up to date. Then I hope that your gemological practice will be characterized by a minimum of errors, a maximum of perfect results, and an optimum of joy. I wish you all the best and what is generally necessary in human life—a bit of good luck. Thank you.
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