Is there a difference between brilliance and luster in gemstones?
Brilliance and luster have loose meanings in everyday language, but they are technical terms in gemology. Brilliance refers to the light reflected from the interior of a gem. Thus only a transparent gemstone can be said to have brilliance. Luster, on the other hand, refers to the light reflected from a gem's surface. Brilliance is graded from low to high, but luster is usually described in terms such as vitreous (like glass), adamantine (like diamond), silky, resinuous and greasy.
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