Warning – don’t buy silver jewelry before reading this

There are many different names for silver jewelry on the market today. So, what are all these types of silver and what do they mean?
This article will educate you so you understand what the different terminologies are when you are buying silver jewelry or silver articles.
What is silver?
Silver is a metal which has been used for hundreds of years. Silver is mined from many countries but the biggest producers are Mexico, Peru and Australia.
Silver in its pure form, is normally considered too soft for everyday use. Therefore, other metals are added to the pure silver such as cooper.
The different types of “Silver”
Sterling silver is the main type of silver used in jewelry, ornaments & dinnerware today. This is solid silver. Sterling silver is a mixture of 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% metal alloy.
Sterling silver is hallmarked as “925”.
Fine silver is 99.9% pure silver and is normally considered too soft to use for most items. It is also solid silver.
Silver plating is common and sometimes dishonest sellers try to pass this off as sterling silver. It’s also call electroplated silver or silver coated as well. Silver plated items are made using a base metal, normally brass or nickel, which is then put through an electroplating process. Electroplating is a process which adheres a very very thin layer of pure silver onto the base metal.
The result is a sterling silver looking item at a much reduced price. It may look like sterling silver but the silver plating tends to wear off quite quickly exposing the less than beautiful base metal.
Alpaca Silver or German Silver is not actually silver at all. It is a greyish looking alloy which resembles silver. It is sometimes referred to as nickel silver, paktong, and new silver. It is also used as a base for silver plated items because of its appearance. If you want real silver, stay away from this. Also, beware of sellers selling this as “fine jewelry” to consumers that don’t know the difference between sterling silver and alpaca silver.
Mexican Silver is silver is used to describe silver made in Mexico. It must have more than 90% pure silver content to be Mexican silver. Most silver jewelry from Mexico today is actually sterling silver.
Britannia Silver has a pure silver content of 95.85% and no more than 4.16% copper. This silver is marked in the U.K. and Ireland as "958 silver." It is an even more pure form of silver than sterling silver. Hence it’s higher valuer.
Antiquing of Sterling Silver JewelryAntiquing is very common in the silver industry today and is the practice of applying a finishing process to sterling silver to give the item an appearance of age. As well as giving the item an appearance of age, it also helps to produce a contrast which makes the details of intricate designs stand out better.

About the Gold and Silver Jewelry Quality Mark

It may sound a bit of a surprise, but the jewelry is not made of pure noble metals as in their original state they don’t often have the necessary properties. For instance, gold is too soft to work with. To give them the necessary mechanical properties and a wishful color nonferrous metals are brought into. Thus, we get different alloys, for example, that of gold with silver and copper, sometimes with palladium, nickel, zinc and cadmium.It is the precious metal content that determines the mark of quality.
In the USA, Britain and Switzerland the carat system is used. According to the carat system the 1000th mark of quality of the precious metal corresponds to 24 conventional units. In most European countries the metric system of the mark defining is used. It means that it is defined by the number of parts of the precious metal in 1000 weight units of the alloy.
The quality mark of precious metals alloys is set legislatively and is guaranteed by the state. All the jewelry necessarily undergoes the assay control to ensure it. As a result the mark of assay is put. The mark is defined by its digits. It’s up to a country to choose the form and the pattern of the mark of assay.
Very widely used in jewelry are 18k gold alloys as their properties are most suitable to work with. They contain: silver - 7,0%- 15,0% , palladium - up to 14%, nickel - up to 4%, zinc up to 2,4%, nickel - 7,5% - 16,5%, zinc - 2,0% - 5,0%, copper - up to 15%.
Another popular alloy is 14k gold. The alloys of this standard can have different colors. The color is influenced by the qualitative ratio of the ferrous metals.For instance, if 14k gold alloy (58, 3% - gold) contains silver – 36% and copper 5, 7% the alloy gets a greenish color. With silver- 18,3% and copper -23,4% - the pink one. With silver 8,3% and copper 33,4% - a reddish color.
The so-called white gold is often used in the jewelry with diamonds. The 14k white gold alloy contains: silver - 23,7% - 28,7%, palladium - 13,0% - 18%, nickel - 17%, zinc - 8,7%, copper - 16%. The 18k white gold alloy contains: silver - 7,0% - 15,0% , palladium - up to 14%, nickel - up to 4%, zinc up to 2,4%, nickel - 7,5% - 16,5%, zinc - 2,0% - 5,0%, copper - up to 15%.
The gold alloy of the 958th standard (metric system) or 24k is not durable and that is why rarely used. The gold alloy of the 375th standard or 10k contains: gold - 37,5%, silver - 10,0%, copper - 48%, palladium - 3,8%. Jewelry containing less than 37.5% of gold is not considered gold jewelry.
The most widely used is the silver alloy containing 92.5% silver and 7.5% alloy. It is used for the jewelry and the cutlery. The silver and brass stuff is frequently covered with a thin layer of rhodium or silver of the 999th standard (silvering).

The Beneficent hush-hush of Stones

Rocks, stones and crystals, precious or not have their own electromagnetic
Frequency. They contain a specific energy, express oneself by their color and
Inner structure. With all this, we don't like just all stones, but just those
Which enter into resonance with our energetic field, sending us the energy
that we need in that precise moment.

Gold, silver and copper
For the healing effect of the stones to be more intense, they must be carried
into the right of energetic center that we have on our body, correspondingly,
above ours heart or above ours neck, by all means direct on skin, because the
energy and our heat amplifies the inner energy of the stone, and in the same
time magnify the effectiveness.
The ear-rings with crystals balances the force of our intellectual hemispheres,
and the rings stimulate the influence to the specific meridians to the hand that
they are carried ( on the left hand they stimulates the reception of energy,
and right hand the emission).
It is important to keep in mind that the recommended metals for the stones
mounting are silver, gold and copper, the others being energetic unstrung,
reason for which they act as some power energetic vampires.
The compulsory cleansing
Before you use or carry the stones, we recommend purifying them, in order to
don't take over, negative power and his weak load, stored before they came
into our possession.
For this it is enough to hold the stone an hour below strong water cold spurt,
for choice of spring, or between 30 as far as 70 hours in brine. If you want
a drastic purification, therefore either we keep 24 of hours the respective
stone in bay salt either we bury it in earth on all of a lunar loop.
The flux of energy

Once we have purified is needfulness render our stone the positive energy.
Just expose it to the sun three day consecutive or exposit to the moon shine
if is talking about opal.
Crystal therapy
Crystal therapy don't replace the pure medical methods of treatments but just
potentiate and balance the power connections short cuted by the disease.
Thus:
Amethyst acts against the insomnia, of the apprehension and the trepidation and is
recommended in diets, potentiate the debilitation in weight.
Aquamarine attenuates the sea sickness and the disturbances of urination .
The coral helps with digestion, soothes the headaches and cures affections
of the oral cavity.
The transparent quartz inducts get along with the life, and one light-tight
silence and agreement.
The rose quartz reacts on the heart and the circulation and helps with the
reconstruction after an affective trauma.
The diamond sweeps off the fogs and disclose the direction in life.
The jade inducts calm in moments of stress and emotive tension.
The pearl dissolves the hostilities and the bad continuations and reinforces
the inner force and hope.
The emerald decreases the congestions and balance the internal energies.
Turquoise reacts on the lungs and the neck.