Can Green Aventurine Scratch Glass? (ANSWERED)

Yes, green aventurine can scratch glass.

In the article that follows, we’ll explain.

Can Green Aventurine Scratch Glass? (EXPLAINED)

To understand why green aventurine can scratch glass, you’d have to compare the Mohs hardness of each mineral.

Green aventurine registers as 6.5-7, while most glass is 5.5-7.

With such similarities in hardness, it is conceivable that rubbing a green aventurine stone against glass would leave marks.

In this article, we’ll examine each mineral in detail as to why this is the case.

Glass: What You Need To Know

Let’s first take a look at glass.

This material has been in use by humans since the Stone Age.

In addition to using stone and wooden tools, our primordial ancestors also used obsidian, a naturally occurring glass formed via volcanic activity.

As for the first manufactured glass, most experts agree that it has been in use since the 14^th century BC.

An ancient-Roman historian, Pliny the Elder, wrote how glass production started along the Phoenician coast, now known to us as Lebanon.

Even though the inventor’s name has been lost to time, the Palestinian area has been isolated as the most likely place where it all started.

The technique was later developed by both the ancient Mesopotamians and Egyptians.

Seeing as how glass blowing didn’t start until the Syrians invented it in the 1^st century BC, glass making was a difficult and expensive process, and only simple products could be made, such as beads for necklaces, amulets, small bottles, figures, and other precious treasures.

To own glass products at that time meant you were either royal, or very rich, considering how difficult the process was back then.

When the ancient Romans came around, they then spread the technique of glass blowing/manufacturing throughout their entire empire so that the average person could afford some of that precious material.

How would early glass fare against green aventurine?

Difficult to say, as most early glass was made of silica sand, or silicone dioxide (SiO2), meaning its Mohs hardness would’ve been at 7.

Considering the 6-7 hardness of green aventurine, it’s quite possible for the mineral to scratch glass.

Then what about the earliest form of glass, obsidian?

Yes, it would be scratched by the mineral in question.

Obsidian is slightly softer with a 5-6 hardness.

In our present time, how many examples of glass can you name from where you’re sitting?

The screen on your phone, the lightbulbs that illuminate the room, or even your living room window. Glass, as we know it today, is just about everywhere.

However, some forms are more common than others.

Take soda-lime glass, for example.

It makes up around 90% of all glass manufactured today.

This material makes up sheet glass products, bottles, food jars, high voltage insulators, and even the window that lets in sunlight into your home.

Soda-lime, like ancient forms of glass, has a high silica sand content of 71-75%. Other compounds are mixed in to make it more malleable, such as 10-15% lime (CaO), 12-16% sodium bicarbonate (Na2O), and tiny amounts of dye to give some finished products color.

Other common types of glass we use today are crystal and borosilicate.

We see crystal in the form of wine glasses, fancy dishware, bowls, or even an ashtray.

Similar to soda-lime, the majority of crystal glass is silica sand, ranging from 54 to 65%. Other materials mixed into it include 13-15% alkali oxide and many other oxides.

Borosilicate glass is typically used in “heatproof” applications such as laboratory equipment or soufflé dishes.

The pharmaceutical industry also makes use of borosilicate through ampules used to store drugs and other chemicals, basically anything requiring high resistance to chemical fluctuations.

Like the other two types of glass mentioned earlier, borosilicate has a high silica sand content, around 70-80%.

Its remaining composition contains 4-8% sodium and potassium oxide, 2-7% aluminum oxide, and 7-13% boron trioxide, hence the name of the glass.

Will green aventurine scratch modern forms of glass?

Yes it’s possible.

Glass such as soda-lime is a bit softer than its ancient predecessors due to the other materials mixed in, permitting malleability but sacrificing hardness.

If any such glass is softer than 6.5 or 7 on the Mohs scale, then green aventurine will scratch it.

Now we’ll look at our other mineral, green aventurine, in detail.

Hailing from the aventurine group of minerals, it’s also a form of quartz.

The green kind was labeled in 1837 by a man named J.D. Dan.

This mineral receives its green colors due to fuchsite particles within.

Like glass, green aventurine also has the chemical formula of SiO2, or silicone dioxide.

The name “aventurine” appeared in Italy during the 1600s when glass makers blended tiny particles of copper into a batch of molten glass by mistake.

They called it “avventura,” or “by chance” in English, due to the sparkly effect the accident produced.

This same kind of aventurine is made today and sometimes called a “goldstone” due to the metal particles inside.

Today, green aventurine is made into cabochons and beads for jewelry, bowls, vases, small sculptures, and used as a cheaper substitute for both amazonite and jade.

Most deposits of green aventurine come from southern India, which is also the world’s top commercial producer of the mineral.

Other places such as Tanzania, Russia, Austria, Spain, and Brazil also contain and manufacture it.

Green aventurine is also used as a “chakra stone” or “healing crystal” for the heart in alternative medicine.

To those who practice such methods, the mineral provides courage, confidence, strength, and happiness.

So in conclusion, due to its chemical properties and Mohs hardness, green aventurine can indeed, scratch glass.