• D-E-F  Totally colorless stones with slight differences  in translucence.

 

• G-H  Very white. A grading set is needed to see the color.

 

• I-J  Slight trace of color, Very difficult to see in a mounting.

 

• K-Z  Yellowish to the layman.  This could also be brown or gray

    When diamonds form, seventy five to two hundred and twenty five miles, down inside the earth (where the temperature and pressure are great enough to force carbon atoms together into a cubic arrangement) there is also nitrogen present. Nitrogen is in the same chemical group as carbon and unfortunately fits nicely into the carbon lattice work of a diamond. Light passing through the pure carbon portion of a diamond is virtually unimpeded, and for all practical proposes all of it passes through. But when light hits a carbon atom, all the wave lengths except for yellow are absorbed. The yellow passes on through. The yellow in a diamond is not the bad aspect. It is the light that is being adsorbed that is the culprit. The yellow is merely an indicator of how much light is being adsorbed. If part of the light is being absorbed, the diamond is not as bright and brilliant. 

    Even though it is difficult to see the yellow of an I or J colored diamond in the mounting, it does not mean that they are as bright as a D , E  or F colors. It merely means that the indicator of what is being adsorbed is not strong enough to see. The layman CAN see the difference that color makes in the brilliance of diamonds if he sees side by side comparisons. This difference in brilliance  is sometimes very dramatic.

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Last modified: October 08, 2008