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Lyncurium, Jacinth

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166                 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS.
engrave ; but the definition of its two distinctive colours, as purple and crimson, (purpura-coccus), proves it indubit­ably the Spinel (' Precious Stones,' p. 228). The former was reckoned by the Romans (at least the yellow kind) amongst the Chrysolithi : a numerous genus, including every yellow stone, from the Oriental Topaz to the humble yellow Crystal, or Cairngorum. Some of the Indian Chrysolithi were evidently Jacinths, and the notice of the defect in the Arabian that they were cloudy and filled up as it were with their own filings or dust, aptly expresses the peculiar porousness of this stone.
Modern jewellers universally term Jacinth, a gem belong ing to a totally different species, the Cinnamon-stone (Esso-nite), a reddish brown Garnet, greatly resembling it in out­ward appearance. But the Cinnamon-stone may readily be detected by its total want of electricity, and also by the clearness or glassy nature of its substance when held against the sun, so different from the porous Jacinth. It possibly was Pliny's (44) Chryselectrus, " dyed with saffron, and only to be distinguished from a paste by its coldness." The Cinnamon-stone was engraved upon by the Romans and the later Persians, but not to nearly the same exteut as the real Jacinth. The Eenaissance artists, however, em­ployed both very largely for works in relief, principally the pale yellow kind, which alone was then at their command. The ancients very rarely cut their camei in single-coloured stones, except in the dark-red or the purple Morios fancied by them appropriate to the subjects.
The derivation of the name "Jacinth" is curious, and the following appear to have been the steps by which it came to be transferred to the modern gem from one of a totally different family and appearance, which thereby has in its turn lost its original designation. "Jacinth," (the French retain the original "Hyacinthe,") comes to us from
Lyncurium, Jacinth Page of 384 Lyncurium, Jacinth
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