What’s happening here?

[barbaradilek]

I bought a vintage 3 strand cultured Pearl necklace,which has blemished pearls but a gorgeous paste clasp.The necklace is 14” long,the majority of pearls look cultured,but some blemished pearls seem to have another pearl inside.What am I looking at please?Sorry,seem to have downloaded the same pic twice!

 

[CortezPearls]

Hi Barbara! Nice to see you back

Well, the pearls seem to have some "peeled" off nacre, thus you are seeing another pearl inside...in the end pearls are just like onions, so you are seeing the same as you would see if you peeled an onion: the inner onion.
The one that looks like a window crack...that one possibly had some trapped gas, so it allows it to look this way. Is the "inner pearl" moving around or stays put?

 

[barbaradilek]

Hi Douglas thanks for your prompt reply,the inside” onion” doesn’t move,but there is an amount of hard dark material between the outer nacre shell and the inner one,I was too scared to try and dislodge it incase I cracked the outside more.Am I looking at a natural Pearl here,or would the inserted bead have been pretty small?The nacre on the inside onion is just amazing quality compared to the outer shell,a little glimpse of what might have been….

 

[CortezPearls]

I've seen this on both cultured and natural pearls. There are moments in a pearl's life when it could have started producing gas due to a bacterial infection within the pearl sac, thus the nacre grows on top of a protein layer...the layer is elastic and can expand just like a balloon.
The following photo shows a cultured pearl with exactly this case: the outer layer cracked and you can see the bead.
This was a "gas giant" pearl with a 6 mm bead and the pearl was about 12 mm.

Of course, when it cracked it "oozed" this hideous and nauseating liquid that I fondly call "Pepe" or "Pearl Petroleum". But this photo was taken when the pearl had dried up and the smell was mostly gone (thank Heavens!).

 

[CortezPearls]

Made a video some years ago....

 

[pattye]

Love this educational video, Douglas, and SO happy I didn't have to smell it! Some of the gas pearls have gorgeous colors!

 

[CortezPearls]

They sure do! That broken pearl I depicted above had great metallic colors...very Abalone-like!
But oooooh the smeeell!

 

[barbaradilek]

I wasted a happy hour looking at each Pearl in this necklace,and I’m wondering if in times past someone had used two necklaces to make this little show off.There are about 20 pearls that show some kind of onion effect( I love that description!) and the rest have obvious beads in them,with a fairly respectable thickness of nacre,but nothing like the others.My upload capacity here is rubbish,so I can only send 2 photos,though possibly that enough..We’ve all been bored with the favourite aunt sharing endless pics of a fat grumpy infant….

 

[CortezPearls]

LOL
What a description Barbara! I could picture it perfectly

 

[barbaradilek]

There’s such a thing as sentimental value,I mentioned earlier that I thought maybe there were 2 different strands made into one necklace,maybe,
although poor quality in your eyes,they weren’t to a past owner.

 

[jshepherd]

Your photos are of an older (possibly vintage) strand of near-round akoya pearls. The nacre looks quite thick from the peeled portions, so it probably was once a lustrous strand of pearls.

 

[barbaradilek]

Oops.my apologies to Douglas,the comment I made reads very abruptly,and he hadn’t made any negative comments about the pearls at all.Thank you Jeremy for your comments, Old pearls have a fascination because they carry a secret history( and possibly detritus of the previous owner if you don’t clean them thoroughly when first acquired!!)Although there are obvious guide lines to judge a “ good” pearl,they all go pear shaped when factors like origin or scarcity enter the scene.I live in Scotland,and have never seen an above average Scottish river pearl,but as soon as the provenance is attached it’s value rockets.

 

[jshepherd]

They absorb their environment and that's why they change! It's like they carry their history with them.

 

[CortezPearls]

No need for apologies dear! We're just Scots having fun with Pearls

 

[CortezPearls]

They sure do Jeremy! The pearls and their owners become intertwined in a song that sings of love, wealth, betrayal, near escapes...I have heard so many stories and I am sure there are new ones to be heard.

 

[barbaradilek]

It seems only pearls have this ability ,maybe because they are a product of something living,and maybe that’s why older pearls hold such a fascination…..

 

[CortezPearls]

Produced by a living creature and then worn by a living person...most gems are the opposite. So yes, you got an interesting point there Barbara