Garnet is January's traditional and modern birthstone

 

January's traditional and modern birthstone : Garnet

Although garnets are a blend of mineral species with many commonalities, the deep red variety is most associated with January. However, garnets range in color from deep red and dark pink/purple to yellow, orange, and several shades of green. You might even find an incredibly rare blue garnet.
Garnets popularly signify trust and friendship. Traditionally, this gem was believed to protect people during their travels. Due to its hardness, a garnet makes an excellent stone for jewelry intended for daily wear.

Garnet birthstone of the month January

Although garnet is commonly associated with the color red, these gemstones can be found in almost any color and are popular choices for jewelry of all types. That's excellent news if you're in the market for the January birthstone. The garnet family is one of the most complex in the gem world. It's not a single species but rather consists of several species and varieties.

Symbolism of january's birthstone Garnet

The name garnet derives from the Latin word for grain due to the similarity between their rounded crystals and a pomegranate's seeds. Garnet is the official birthstone for January and signifies protection, friendship, trust, commitment, and love. Garnet is also said to keep the wearer safe during travel.
Some believe that garnets are a protective stone, shielding the wearer from injury. This made them particularly popular amongst warriors and royalty. Occasionally associated with life-giving blood, red-variety garnets are also connected to vitality, love, and light.

Garnet symbolism is rich and varied. Cultures all over the world have prized this gemstone for its beautiful colors and durability. The traditional January birthstone has also inspired many legends and popular associations with love, friendship, light, and vitality.

The Garnet Gemstone, january' birthstone is an ancient gemstone

People have used garnets for jewelry and decorative objects for millennia. It's one of the oldest known gemstones. Archeologists have recovered garnet necklaces and talismans from Ancient Egyptian tombs and mummies.

The Ancient Greeks and Romans also highly valued this gem. They used garnet signet rings to seal important documents as well as for a variety of jewelry pieces and other items.

In fact, the word "garnet" comes from the Latin word granatus for seed or grain, most likely a reference to the seeds of the pomegranate fruit. Indeed, some garnets do resemble pomegranate seeds in color, size, and shape.

Many so-called carbuncles have proven to be red garnets, especially almandines, the most common variety of garnet. However, some of these stones are not garnets. Nevertheless, much of the folklore surrounding carbuncles has now become part of the folklore of garnets.

In modern gemology, garnet is actually a mineral group that encompasses many related species of gems. Garnets most often occur in combinations of these species and rarely ever occur as a pure single species. So, keep in mind that much garnet symbolism predates the modern definition of garnet.

Some carbuncles were said to shine as if they had an internal light. In fact, the word comes from the Latin carbunculus for a small, hot coal. 
According to Jewish tradition, Noah brought a gem into the Ark as a source of light. During the Flood, the Sun and Moon didn't shine, but this precious stone shone "more brilliant by night than by day, so enabling Noah to distinguish between day and night." Some accounts refer to this gem as a carbuncle or, by association, a garnet.

The motif of a garnet that can emit light appears in the American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story, The Great Carbuncle (1837). In this moral tale, a group of adventurers seek a legendary gem in the White Mountains of New Hampshire that shines with a red light so brilliant it could "make a noonday of midnight." After a wise, simple couple find but reject the stone "which would have dimmed all earthly things," its brilliance faded.

Garnets , january's birthstones for Protection

The belief that garnets have the power to shield their wearers from harm is very widespread. Saxon and Celtic kings favored garnet inlaid jewelry because of this supposed protection. Native American healers similarly believed that garnets had protective powers against injury and poison. According to Judeo-Christian tradition, King Solomon wore garnets into battle. During the Crusades, Christian and Muslim warriors both wore garnets.

During the Middle Ages, some believed carved gemstones occurred that way miraculously in nature. Although gem carving was well-known in previous centuries, knowledge of this practice had declined in Europe at this time. Specific carvings on specific gems presumably had special magical powers. For example, according to Ragiel's 13th century CE work, The Book of Wings: The well-formed image of a lion, if engraved on a garnet, will protect and preserve honors and health, cures the wearer of all diseases, brings him honors, and guards him from all perils in traveling.

Perhaps due to the stone's reputation for protection, royalty often wore garnets. For example, Mary Queen of Scots, Queen Victoria, and the Russian Czarinas were all well-known for wearing garnets as adornments on their garments.

Garnets, Blood, and Life Force

Since ancient times, garnet's traditional red color was associated with the heart and blood. Thus, people believed garnet's mystical purview included the power to counter melancholy, stir the heart to great deeds, prevent hemorrhage, and improve circulation.

The Hunza warriors from Kashmir shot garnet pellets with bows and later guns, believing that the stones would inflict particularly bloody wounds.

Garnet's color and inner fire could also presumably stir a person's creative energy. Garnets have been symbolically associated with life force, especially the feminine life force.

In Europe during the Middle Ages, the clergy valued garnets as symbols of Christ's blood and sacrifice. (Amethyst was another stone associated with the suffering of Christ because its color was believed to resemble wounds).

Love and Friendship

With associations with the heart, blood, inner fire, and life force, garnets have long been considered symbols of love. Garnet symbolism also extends to friendship. However, these connections are surprisingly sinister.

In Greek mythology, Persephone, the goddess of vegetation, was kidnapped by Hades, the god of the Underworld. She could only return to the surface world if she didn't eat any food in that realm. Since she ate some pomegranate seeds, she had to remain in the Underworld for that many months out of the year, which results in the months of winter.

Because of garnet's association with pomegranate seeds, the stone has come to stand for the safe return of a friend or loved one. Garnets were said to protect travelers on their journeys and were often exchanged between friends as tokens that they would meet again. (Though in the myth, the pomegranate seeds bind Persephone to return to Hades).