Bought an antique sapphire bracelet- please help

[poppers986]

so i bought this bracelet from ebay

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120597315157&_trksid=p2761.l1259

i love it, but the problem is, i can't tell whether its genuine or not. i took to 4 different jewelers and 3 of them said that they think its synthetic, but its hard to tell because of the setting, (they used a magnifying glass). any sure way of knowing, i know that its not a bad price for an antique, but honestly, i wouldnt have paid that much for glass, regardless of how old it is, there are more intricate pieces that go for less than that on ebay.

please help!! and taking it to the GIA, isn't worth it, itll cost more than what i paid for it!

 

[AntiqueShopper]

It is hard to tell from the image, but in my experiences with old jewelry, most sapphire pieces are synthetic. Do you have any other pictures? The image only pops up for a second, and then it disappears again. Is it set in gold? Silver?

 

[poppers986]

oh you have to scroll down for more pics, its set in 800 silver, i was told that that's common of the time period

 

[AntiqueShopper]

IMHO, I think the stones are synthetic. I think you paid a fair price for the piece, however (about $130).

 

[poppers986]

yeah thats what people are telling me, but i myself would have just let it go for that much. wish i knew that you could tell by just looking at the pics, i would have checked here first. i thought the authentications were for designer pieces

 

[Swanky]

jewelers can't tell?!

 

[poppers986]

the bangle is solid in the back so the light can't shine through the stone. they believe that it is synthetic, but not 100% sure and the seller is insisting that she had it "electronically" checked and that it is genuine. oh and the 1st jeweler is a gemologist, but again he only looked with a magnifying glass, none of the jewelers i went to had a machine to check. also the first one was pretty sure, the stones that he saw clearly were glass.

 

[poppers986]

but again, there were only a a couple of stones that he saw clearly

 

[BagaholicAnon]

Take it to one of those cash for gold places or a pawn shop. I took some jewelry to one and they have these chemicals that they use to test the stones to determine what they are.

 

[poppers986]

yeah i was going to try to take it to pawn shop, those chemicals wont damage it, will it? do they charge to test?

 

[cindyuwho]

Isn't lab made sapphire corundum just like the real thing so a chemical check would read "sapphire" even if man made. I recently bought an antique sapphire piece too. I think you need someone that has looked at real and man made to look under a microscope to determine if it is real.

 

[poppers986]

well, i dont think there was lab made sapphire back then. a synthetic stone is glass.

and i think man made stones had an engraving on them or something stating that its lab created

 

[Kitsunegrl]

I didn't think setting gemstones in silver was common until this century.
When I think of Edwardian style jewelry, I think platinum.

Legit manmade stones may have had markings, but people making jewelry to intentionally sell fake as real would not have put markings on stones. They make is as close to real as possible.

 

[AntiqueShopper]

I didn't think setting gemstones in silver was common until this century.
When I think of Edwardian style jewelry, I think platinum.

Legit manmade stones may have had markings, but people making jewelry to intentionally sell fake as real would not have put markings on stones. They make is as close to real as possible.

White gold was not invented until 1912 or 1914, hence jewelry was either set in silver or platinum. There are many examples of filagree pieces made of sterling silver out there. A lot of silver pieces contain onyx, carnelian, etc.

 

[RoryX]

Its highly unlikely that a jeweler would have put that much quality sapphire into a .800 silver bracelet. I vote for glass or synthetic sapphire. It a very pretty bracelt though.