History
The existence of the amber is dated back to over 130 million years, with the recent discovery being over 100 million years ago. The trade of the amber has been passed down from different people from the 1400s till its widespread.
The amber’s ability to get electrically charged and attract little things like tiny pieces of papers if spread around it, was discovered by Thales of Miletus in 600 B.C.
The oldest polished ambers date back to 40000 to 10000 BC. Amber trade was quite popular among the areas at the time as it was used to create praying rosaries for them. Other areas across the world where it has been discovered includes Dominica, New Jersey, Denmark, Borneo, and Siberia and other places in Europe. So it is best to check for the origin of the amber that you are getting to be sure it is right from the original source that is backed by history.
For the trade to happen, there were three amber tracks used, the first being the Adriatic Coast, the second led through the Mediterranean Sea, and the third through Eastern Europe.
Formation:
The amber is formed when a tree drips resins, these resins when dripping get in contact with insects and seeds and debris on the way and sometimes soil too. These trees which produced the resins are since extinct, and when they fell, they decayed and decomposed leaving the resins in large amount. The resins eventually were covered by soil and in the long run, after millions of years, the amber got hardened.
The tree specifically is the pine tree known as pinussuccinefera. Although the cherry and plum trees produce resins the create the red amber, the most popular amber being the yellow amber is gotten from the pinussuccinefera.
The composition of amber is 80% carbon, 10% of oxygen and 10% of hydrogen.
The color of each amber depends solely on its structure and the condition it was formed in.
When light passes through an amber on a white surface, it produces a blue amber, when an amber has come in contact with too much debris and soil, you get the black Amber, when a yellow amber comes in contact with heat, the green amber is produced, when an amber is exposed to an intense heat a red amber is formed, and when an amber is heated by a lot of sunlight it produces the white amber.
