SPESSARTITE

Spessartite garnet belongs to the large and varied mineral group of garnet. Garnet comes from the Latin word "granatus", which means grain, because many garnet deposits are small grains of red crystals in their host rock. The fiery sunny-orange stone is popular for its very good hardness (7.5 Mohs scale) and its brilliance due to its high refractive index. Until the recent discovery mines in Namibia and Mozambique, spessartite garnet was rarely seen in jewelry. Its name is derived from former occurrence in the German "Spessart" forest. Garnet is a January birthstone.