aventurine

English

WOTD – 21 July 2019

Etymology

Aventurine glass (sense 1), also known as goldstone

Unpolished (top) and polished aventurine quartz (sense 2)

Borrowed from French aventurine, from Italian avventurino, from avventurare (“to venture; to make lucky or prosperous”), from avventura (“chance; adventure, venture”) + -are (suffix forming the infinitive of most regular verbs), apparently so named because it was discovered by accident in Murano, Italy, when brass or copper filings were dropped into melted glass^[1] (see, however, the 1843 quotation).

Pronunciation

(Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /əˈvɛn.t͡ʃə.ɹɪn/, /əˈvɛn.tjʊə.ɹɪn/
Audio (Received Pronunciation): (file)
(General American) IPA^(key): /əˈvɛn.t͡ʃə.ɹɪn/, /əˈvɛn.t͡ʃəˌɹin/
Hyphenation: aven‧tur‧ine

Noun

aventurine (countable and uncountable, plural aventurines)

A kind of brownish glass containing gold-coloured spangles.
Synonym: goldstone
- 1843 March 1, [Friedrich] Wöhler, “Manufacture and Analysis of Aventurine Glass”, in William Francis, Henry Croft, editors, The Chemical Gazette, or Journal of Practical Chemistry, in All Its Applications to Pharmacy, Arts and Manufactures, volume I, number IX, London: Published by Richard and John E[dward] Taylor, […], →OCLC, pages 244–245 and 246:
  [pages 244–245] Aventurine is a brown glass flux, containing very small glittering particles, which give it a peculiarly glittering appearance. It was formerly manufactured into objects of art and ornament at Murano near Venice. [...] The statements which are found respecting it in technological works, according to which it is obtained by fusing down with glass minute particles of gold, copper, brass, mica, or talc, are not correct, as the microscopic examination of aventurine plainly shows. [page 246] There can be no doubt therefore that the crystals in the aventurine consist of metallic copper, which were separated in a crystalline state from the fused glass containing oxide of copper by the addition of some reducing substance.
- 1865 December, J. Pelouze [i.e., Théophile-Jules Pelouze], “On a New Aventurine, with Chrome as a Base”, in David Brewster, Robert Kane, William Francis, editors, The London, Edinburgh, and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, volume XXX (Fourth Series), number 205, London: Taylor and Francis, […], printers and publishers to the University of London; sold by Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer; [et al.], →OCLC, page 456:
  With 40 grms. of the bichromate, the fusion is decidedly more difficult, and the glass is filled with extremely brilliant crystals. Those persons who saw specimens of this glass, at once compared it to Venetian aventurine, and called it chrome aventurine, which name I propose to retain. [...] Chrome aventurine sparkles in the sun and in strongly lighted places; in this respect it is surpassed by diamond alone. It is harder than common glass, which it scratches and cuts easily, and is especially harder than the Venetian aventurine; hence its greater value.
- 1877, [Johannes] Rudolf Wagner, “Division III. Technology of Glass, Ceramic Ware, Gypsum, Lime, and Mortar.”, in William Crookes, transl., A Handbook of Chemical Technology [...] Translated and Edited from the Eighth German Edition, with Extensive Additions, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton and Company, […], →OCLC, page 291:
  Aventurin or avanturin glass was formerly made only in the Island of Murano, near Venice, but is now prepared throughout Germany, Italy, Austria, and France. It is a brown glass mass in which crystalline spangles of metallic copper according to [Friedrich] Wöhler (of protoxide of copper according to [Max Joseph] von Pettenkofer) appear dispersed. [...] The Bavarian and Bohemian glass-houses produce an aventurin glass rivalling the original.
(mineralogy, by extension) A variety of translucent quartz, spangled throughout with scales of yellow mica.
- 1860, C[harles] W[illiam] King, “Aventurine”, in Antique Gems: Their Origin, Uses, and Value as Interpreters of Ancient History; and as Illustrative of Ancient Art: With Hints to Gem Collectors, London: John Murray, […], section I (Materials), page 63:
  The Sandaresus, an Arabian stone, classed by Pliny [the Elder] among the Carbunculi, seems to have been our Aventurine, for he describes it as full of golden stars shining through a transparent substance, not from the surface, but from within the body of the stone. The true Aventurine, or Goldie-stone, is a brownish semi-transparent quartz, full of specks of yellow mica.
- 1872 July, George S. Burleigh, “Precious Stones. IX. Aventurine and Lapis-lazuli.”, in Oliver Optic [pseudonym; William Taylor Adams], editor, Oliver Optic’s Magazine. Our Boys and Girls, volume XII, number 228, Boston, Mass.: Lee and Shepard, publishers; New York, N.Y.: Lee, Shepard and Dillingham, →OCLC, page 477, column 2:
  Aventurine is a variety of grainy quartz,—not quarts of rye whiskey, which there is too much of a venture in,—but quartz of silica, gold-spangled throughout with flakes of yellow mica. [...] There are two kinds of natural aventurine; the one with its spangles of yellow mica is well known as Muscovite talc. It was found on the shores of the White Sea in old times, and is now met with often in the mines of Silesia, in Bohemia, in France, and in Siberia. The other variety, more highly esteemed, is found in Spain and in Scotland. [...] Dealers have given the name of aventurine to a species of feldspar having the same external characteristics, and sold for the genuine, though a much softer stone. Such dealers are not honest.
- 1874, Alfred Tennyson, “Gareth and Lynette”, in Idylls of the King (The Works of Alfred Tennyson; V), cabinet edition, London: Henry S. King & Co., […], →OCLC, page 73:
  [F]rom out the silken curtain-folds / Bare-footed and bare-headed three fair girls / In gilt and rosy raiment came: their feet / In dewy grasses glisten'd; and the hair / All over glanced with dewdrop or with gem / Like sparkles in the stone Avanturine.
- 1882, Christopher Dresser, “The Lacquer Manufactures”, in Japan: Its Architecture, Art, and Art Manufactures, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., →OCLC, pages 346–347:
  During this period of two centuries little colour was employed in the lacquer-work, but much gold was used; and those particular kinds of work in which "clouded" gold effects, avanturines, and tesselated gold are introduced, as well as low-relief modelling of a most perfect kind, were invented and brought to a high state of perfection.
- 1957, Dorothy M[cKenney] Schlegel, “Semiprecious Gems”, in Gem Stones of the United States (Contributions to Economic Geology; Geological Survey Bulletin; 1042-G), Washington, D.C.: Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior; United States Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 222:
  Quartz with spangled inclusions is known as aventurine. The included minerals are scales of shiny mica or hematite. The most familiar aventurine is of a reddish-yellow color and has a coppery sheen. Only small quantities of aventurine have been found in the United States.
- 1998, Joris-Karl Huysmans, chapter 9, in Margaret Mauldon, transl., edited by Nicholas White, Against Nature (A rebours) (Oxford World’s Classics), Oxford, Oxfordshire, New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 84:
  He stood up and gloomily opened a little silver-gilt box, its lid studded with aventurines. It was full of violet sweetmeats; he took one, feeling it with his fingers as he reflected upon the strange properties of this bonbon whose sugar-coating looked like hoar-frost; [...]
- 2003, “The Mineral Kingdom. Dictionary of Gems, Jewels, Precious Metals and Minerals, with Their Significance and Use in the Superstition and Folklore of All Countries”, in Cora Linn Daniels, C[harles] M[acClellan] Stevans, editors, Encyclopædia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World: […], volume II, Honolulu, Hi.: University Press of the Pacific, →ISBN, page 724, column 1:
  Aventurin is also the name of a variety of quartz spangled with mica or other shiny mineral. A variety of spangled feldspar, found especially in Russia, and when polished used as a gem and highly prized, is also called Aventurin or popularly "sunstone".
- 2015, Susan Vaught, “Three Weeks Later”, in Footer Davis ~~Might be~~ Probably is Crazy (A Paula Wiseman Book), New York, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, →ISBN, pages 226–227:
  When I pulled off the lid, I found a leather bracelet inside. Its center held a pretty brass flower, painted white with soft pink tips on the petals, just like clover. On either side of the brass clover flower, one of the bracelet's leather strands had been strung with shimmering green rocks. "Those are aventurines," Peavine said when I touched one smooth stone. "They're for courage and luck. You got a lot of the first, but I figured you could use some of the second."