Moonstone (Rainbow Moonstone)

Item Description

Moonstone (also called rainbow moonstone) is soft milky white stone, but the most valuable variety of this Feldspar features a rainbow sheen. Moonstone shows a silvery or bluish iridescence, that is caused by the intergrowth of two different types of Feldspar with different refractive indexes. Moonstone was very popular with the Romans, who thought it was formed out of moonlight, also used in Roman jewelry since 100 AD. In India moonstone is considered a sacred stone to this day. This stone is from Malawi which is a lesser known locality for the material. While there a reflective flash of green, blue and orange that floats over the top of this stone when it's rotated in the light. The stone has an "Oval Cabochon" cut, and is a good representative example of these well-known gems.