100 Fun Facts About Pearls

Inside which part of a mollusc does a pearl form?

The mantle is the soft tissue that also secretes the shell, and it coats any intruder in layer after layer of nacre.

Pearls are made mainly of which mineral?

It is deposited as aragonite, or a mix of aragonite and calcite, in concentric layers, just like the shell itself.

What is the name for the substance, also called mother-of-pearl, that pearls are built from?

It is a combination of aragonite platelets and the horn-like protein conchiolin.

Why does nacre appear iridescent?

The layers reflect, refract and diffract light; the thinner and more numerous they are, the finer the lustre.

The popular belief that pearls start around a grain of sand is described as what?

Parasites, organic debris or displaced mantle tissue are the usual triggers.

Which common household liquid can dissolve a pearl?

The acetic acid reacts with the calcium carbonate to give calcium acetate and carbon dioxide, which is how Cleopatra's famous wager supposedly worked.

Per Pliny the Elder, which queen dissolved a priceless pearl in a drink to win a dinner-party bet?

Pliny valued the pearl at tens of millions of sesterces.

What word describes pearls that are irregular rather than round?

Perfectly round, smooth pearls command the highest prices, but baroque shapes have their own market.

Which examination technique is used to tell a natural pearl from a beaded cultured pearl?

A beaded cultured pearl shows a different internal structure; natural pearls show growth rings separated by thin layers of conchiolin.

Rubbing two real pearls together feels slightly gritty because of what?

Imitation pearls are completely smooth, which is why the tooth test works.

Glass imitation pearls are traditionally coated with 'essence d'Orient', a solution made from what?

Other fakes are simply cut from mother-of-pearl, coral or conch shell.

The English word 'pearl' ultimately comes from the Latin 'perna', meaning what?

The name compares the pearl-bearing bivalve to a ham or leg of mutton.

The Old Persian word for pearl, margarita, is the origin of which girl's name?

It also gives the pearl-mussel family its scientific name, Margaritiferidae.

Which Japanese entrepreneur is credited with creating the first cultured pearl, in 1893?

After near-bankruptcy he produced hemispherical pearls on 11 July 1893 at Ago Bay; his company still bears his name.

What business did the father of the cultured-pearl pioneer run in Toba?

Young Kokichi was hooked on pearls by watching the divers of Ise unload their catch.

Which inventor met Mikimoto in 1927 and marvelled at his cultured pearls?

Mikimoto's patented work is also behind the Phoenix crown worn by Miss Universe.

Which British biologist working in Australia first developed the accepted pearl-culturing process?

He passed the method to Tatsuhei Mise and Tokichi Nishikawa; Nishikawa patented it in 1916 and married Mikimoto's daughter.

In which year was the pearl-culturing patent granted in Japan?

By the 1950s women across the developed world could afford a cultured strand, and natural pearls became a tiny niche.

Akoya pearls come from Pinctada fucata, a small oyster native to the coasts of which two countries?

Because the oyster is only 6 to 8 cm across, akoya pearls over 10 mm are extremely rare.

Which oyster produces the true South Sea pearl, the largest and most valuable of cultured pearls?

It has gold-lipped and silver-lipped varieties, and the Philippines made the South Sea pearl its national gem in 1996.

Tahitian 'black' pearls are grown in which species of oyster?

The black-lip oyster is also farmed in the Cook Islands and Fiji; a truly black pearl is extremely rare.

Why can Tahitian pearls never be mass-produced like freshwater pearls?

Freshwater mussels, by contrast, can carry multiple implants at once.

Most freshwater cultured pearls sold in the 21st century come from which country?

Japan pioneered whole freshwater pearls in Lake Biwa, but that industry has nearly vanished.

What is a 'keshi'?

It forms when the mantle graft slips off the bead; today many keshi are produced on purpose.

21st-century natural pearling is confined mostly to the seas off which country?

Bahrain's Pearling Path, with three oyster beds and 17 buildings on Muharraq, became a World Heritage Site in 2012.

Pliny the Elder praised the pearl fishery of which body of water as the most productive in the world?

Sri Lanka's Gulf of Mannar was another ancient centre, mentioned in the chronicle Mahavamsa.

Spanish conquistadors found a vast pearl bed around Cubagua and Margarita, islands off which country?

A 1558 royal decree ordered that only African slaves, not natives, be used for the deadly diving work.

Pearls were said to be one of the attractions that drew which Roman leader to Britain?

Freshwater pearl mussels still live in Scottish rivers, where they are now legally protected.

Who bought La Peregrina, the pearl once owned by Spanish kings, at Sotheby's in 1969?

He paid 37,000 dollars and gave it to Elizabeth Taylor as a Valentine's Day gift.

Where did Elizabeth Taylor find La Peregrina after it went missing in her Caesars Palace suite?

She casually opened the dog's mouth and there was 'the most perfect pearl in the world'.

La Peregrina passed from Napoleon III to which British aristocratic family, who kept it until 1969?

The exiled emperor sold it to James Hamilton, Marquess and later Duke of Abercorn, for his wife Louisa.

The Pearl of Lao Tzu, also called the Pearl of Allah, is a non-nacreous pearl from which animal?

Found off Palawan in the Philippines, it is 24 cm across and weighs 6.4 kg.

The largest known pearl, the Pearl of Puerto, weighs roughly how much?

A fisherman from Puerto Princesa on Palawan found the 67 cm giant-clam pearl; it weighs 34 kg.

Rare pink 'flame structure' pearls of the Caribbean come from which animal?

They are non-nacreous, and the best show a shimmering 'flame structure' on the surface.

Blue-toned abalone 'blister' pearls are unique to the waters of which country?

Their vivid colours are often compared to opal.

Girl with a Pearl Earring, painted around 1665, is the work of which Dutch master?

It is a tronie, a study of a head not meant as a portrait, and hangs in the Mauritshuis in The Hague.

In 2014 a Dutch astrophysicist argued the famous painted earring looks more like what than pearl?

Vincent Icke cited its specular reflection, pear shape and sheer size.

Which author wrote The Pearl, a novella about a poor diver named Kino in La Paz, Baja California?

It began as a short story in 1945 and grew from a Mexican folk tale he heard on a 1940 visit.

Japan's traditional 'ama' divers, famous for gathering pearls and abalone, are mostly what?

Records of the sea women go back to AD 927; they traditionally wear white, partly to ward off sharks.

Broome, whose pearling industry began in the 1880s, is a town in which Australian state or territory?

It lies in the Kimberley region, over 2,000 km north of Perth, and drew Japanese, Malay and Chinese divers.

Which Philippine president declared the South Sea pearl the national gem in 1996?

Golden South Sea pearls are especially associated with the Philippines and Indonesia.

In the Book of Revelation, the twelve gates of the New Jerusalem are each made from what?

This is the origin of the phrase 'pearly gates'.

Pearls from the rainbow-lipped Pteria sterna oyster do what under ultraviolet light?

The Mexican farm markets them as Concha Nacar.

What is the horn-like organic compound that binds the aragonite crystals in nacre?

Aragonite plus this binder is what makes up mother-of-pearl.

In which year was pearling banned in the UK to protect endangered river mussels?

Publicity over the Abernethy pearl from the River Tay had drawn 'weekend warriors' who stripped mussel beds in the 1970s and 80s.

Japanese freshwater pearl farming began in 1914 using mussels native to which lake?

Japan's largest and oldest lake sits near Kyoto, and its name became shorthand for fine freshwater pearls.

Roughly how many metric tons of freshwater pearls does China produce per year?

Japanese units such as the kan and momme are still encountered in the pearl trade.

Which Japanese weight unit is still the standard for loose pearls and strands among dealers?

The Japanese have used the measure for centuries.

Which Hindu text first documented the sacred Nine Pearls?

Ayurveda also prescribes pearl powder as a digestive stimulant and a treatment for mental ailments.

Which Scottish Highland river was noted for the finest rose-pink freshwater pearls?

Scottish Travellers did most of the pearling, and two firms are still licensed to sell pre-1998 pearls.

At the end of The Pearl, what does Kino do with the gem that has ruined his family?

Kino throws it into the sea after seeing every disaster of the past days reflected in its surface. He had found it only days earlier and dreamed it would lift his family out of poverty.

In The Pearl, which creature's sting to Kino's infant son sets the whole tragedy in motion?

A scorpion stings the baby on the shoulder as Kino lunges to catch it in mid-air. The search for a way to pay a doctor is what sends Kino diving that same day.

Which item from Kino's wish list in The Pearl does he finally carry home, taken from a dead tracker?

A rifle is the wish Kino hardly dares to say aloud, and he ends the story carrying one. By then a tracker's bullet has cost him the son he hoped to raise up.

In The Pearl, why do the rival pearl dealers all bid so little for Kino's find?

They serve one hidden buyer, so the rival offices are a show and the bids are agreed before Kino walks in. The top offer is 1,500 pesos for a pearl he values at 50,000.

Why does the town doctor in The Pearl refuse to treat Kino's badly stung baby at first?

The family cannot pay, and the doctor will not treat a fisherman's child for a handful of small, worthless pearls. He hurries to their hut only once news of the great pearl reaches him.

The plot of The Pearl was borrowed from which kind of source, heard in La Paz in 1940?

A folk tale about a boy who found a great pearl gave the story its bones. The novella turned the boy into a husband and father and added the doctor and the priest.

In The Pearl, which dream for his baby son startles Juana when Kino says it aloud?

He will go to school and learn to read, write and make numbers, Kino declares, so that his parents will know things through him. Kino had never spoken so many words together in his life.

What sound in The Pearl draws the trackers' fatal gunshot toward the family's mountain hiding place?

The baby's cry reaches the trackers by their pool, and one of them takes it for an animal's whimper and fires. The bullet ends the very life the pearl was meant to save.

Fifteen years after The Pearl appeared as a book, its author received which honor for his life's work?

The Nobel Prize in Literature came to him in 1962 for realistic, imaginative writing marked by sympathetic humor. The Pearl, a slim classroom favorite, sits beside far longer books in that body of work.

Which label does the preface of The Pearl itself suggest for Kino's story?

A parable is how the book's own preface invites readers to take the story, each finding a personal meaning in it. It became one of its author's most widely taught books in American classrooms.

What is the name of Kino and Juana's infant son, whose injury opens The Pearl?

Coyotito is the couple's only child, and every plan Kino makes for the pearl's money centers on him. The pet name links him to the coyote, one of many animal echoes in the book.

How is Juan Tomás, who hides the hunted family in The Pearl, related to Kino?

His brother Juan Tomás warns Kino beforehand that the pearl dealers may cheat him. He and his wife later hide the fugitives in their own house for a day.

In The Pearl, what do unseen searchers do to Kino's home after ransacking it for the pearl?

The searchers set it on fire once their digging turns up nothing, and for a while the neighbors believe the family burned inside. That mistake buys Kino a day in hiding.

Which heirloom from Kino's grandfather is found with a hole smashed in its bottom in The Pearl?

The family canoe is the one thing of value Kino owns, the tool that keeps his household from starving. To him, wrecking a boat is a worse crime than taking a life.

The grasping doctor in The Pearl hears of Kino's find and at once daydreams of which European city?

Paris is where the doctor longs to be, and the great pearl looks to him like the fare. He sips chocolate in bed while Kino's family waits at his door.

Turned away by the doctor in The Pearl, Juana dresses her baby's wound with a poultice of what?

Seaweed makes Juana's poultice, a remedy the narrator treats as effective. It simply lacks the doctor's authority, which is why she still prays for a pearl to pay him.

Sent away by a servant in The Pearl, what does Kino strike so hard that his knuckles split?

The doctor's gate takes the blow of his bare fist. The same bloodied hand holds the great pearl a few hours later.

With the pearl's money, Kino's first wish in The Pearl is to give Juana which long-delayed ceremony?

A proper wedding comes first on Kino's list, and in the pearl's surface he pictures Juana in a new skirt and himself in a felt hat. The visions grow bolder with each wish he names.

On hearing of Kino's find in The Pearl, the local priest wonders whether it might pay for what?

Church repairs are the priest's first thought, and he tries to recall what services he has ever done that family. He soon calls at the hut to remind Kino to give thanks.

The first dealer Kino visits in The Pearl compares his huge pearl to which worthless find?

Fool's gold is the dealer's comparison: he calls the pearl too large to sell and of interest only as a curiosity. He then offers a thousand pesos for a gem worth many times that.

Which recurring device lets readers of The Pearl follow Kino's moods, from family calm to danger?

Songs in his head carry the story's feelings: a Song of the Family at breakfast, a Song of Evil when danger nears. His ancestors, the narrator says, turned their whole lives into song.

La Paz, the town where The Pearl unfolds, takes its name from the Spanish for which word?

Peace is what La Paz means, an irony critics relish: the town stays calm only until one fisherman finds a fortune. One early title for the story was The Pearl of La Paz.

Critics read the doctor, priest and pearl dealers of The Pearl as faces of which historical force?

Colonialism runs under the fable: the indigenous fishing families depend on wealthier settlers in town for medicine, religion and prices. Each of those powers tries to profit from Kino's find.

The Pearl is usually taught as a warning about which human failing?

Greed is the failing the story dwells on, and nearly everyone in La Paz catches it once news of the pearl spreads. Even gentle Kino grows suspicious, violent and unwilling to let go.

In The Pearl, which act of Kino's on the dark beach leaves his family no choice but to flee?

Killing an attacker in the dark, even to save his own life, makes Kino a wanted man. Juana finds the dropped pearl on the path and tells him they must be gone before daylight.

How does Kino react in The Pearl when he catches Juana creeping to the shore with the pearl?

He beats her, striking her face and kicking her side, then stalks off up the beach. It is the moment the gentle husband of the opening pages shows how far the pearl has changed him.

As danger nears her baby in The Pearl, Juana mutters an ancient charm and which Catholic prayer?

A Hail Mary follows the older magic, so Juana calls on both faiths at once. The pairing shows how the villagers blend ancestral belief with Catholic teaching.

What does Juana make for breakfast in the calm opening scene of The Pearl, before disaster strikes?

Corncakes from corn Juana grinds herself are the couple's breakfast, eaten in a silence that needs no words. It is the last ordinary morning they will have.

The first pearl dealer in The Pearl hides his shock, but his fingers fumble which small object?

A coin he rolls back and forth across his knuckles slips when he sees the pearl, the only honest reaction in the room. His face stays blank as he names a low price.

The narrator of The Pearl says the oyster bed Kino dives once paid for the wars of which ruler?

The King of Spain grew powerful on pearls from this very bed, the narrator says, so Kino dives where an empire once fed itself. The book never lets the reader forget who profits from these waters.

The Pearl grew out of a 1940 collecting voyage its author made with which marine biologist friend?

Ed Ricketts ran a small lab on Monterey's Cannery Row, selling shore specimens to universities. He was the model for Doc, the good-hearted biologist of his friend's Monterey novels.

The La Paz anecdote behind The Pearl was first recorded in which 1941 nonfiction book by its author?

Sea of Cortez mixed a travel diary with natural history and sold poorly, appearing just as America entered the war. Its narrative half was reissued on its own in 1951.

Which leading director of Mexico's golden-age cinema made La Perla, the 1947 film of The Pearl?

Emilio Fernández directed it and wrote the screenplay with the book's author and Jack Wagner. The picture won the Ariel for Best Picture, Mexico's top film award.

Which Mexican star, later Kerim Bey in From Russia with Love, played Kino on screen in 1947?

Pedro Armendáriz played Kino opposite María Elena Marqués as Juana. Gravely ill while shooting his Bond role years later, he died four months before that picture opened.

The 1947 screen version of The Pearl was chosen in 2002 for which US honor for historic movies?

National Film Registry selection marks a film as culturally, historically or aesthetically significant. This one was shot in Mexico in two versions, one in Spanish and one in English.

In December 1945 The Pearl first reached readers as a short story in which American magazine?

Woman's Home Companion ran it as The Pearl of the World, two years before the expanded book. The monthly was then at its height, with a circulation that peaked above four million.

Before it was a magazine story or a book, The Pearl was begun in 1944 in which form?

A movie script came first, written by an author who knew the story would be filmed. The picture and the finished book then came out in the same year.

Kino in The Pearl shares his name with Eusebio Kino, who explored northwest Mexico in which role?

Jesuit missionary Eusebio Kino proved that Baja California is a peninsula, not an island. In the story the priest reminds Kino that he is named after a great man.

In The Pearl, Kino tells Juan Tomás he cannot give up the pearl because it has become what?

His soul, Kino says, would be lost if he gave the pearl up. It is his parting answer to Juan Tomás as the family slips away north in the dark.

Walking back into La Paz at the end of The Pearl, Juana breaks custom by taking which place?

At Kino's side is where Juana walks, not trailing after him as she did when the story began. Critics read the change as a sign that the ordeal has made the two equals.

Where is Kino's baby son lying in the opening scene of The Pearl when danger first appears?

In a hanging box held up by ropes, the baby lies laughing as the threat creeps down one of those ropes toward him.

In The Pearl, which weapon does Kino use against the first thief who creeps into his hut at night?

A knife is all Kino has, and he strikes the thief with it before taking a blow to the head himself. Afterwards he cleans the blade by driving it into the earth.

Who is Juan Tomás's wife in The Pearl, who leads the mourning for the family believed dead?

Apolonia leads the wailing as the nearest female relative, then finds the family alive and hiding in her own house. She fetches her husband and tells no one else.

The Pearl's author grew up in which California farm town, now home to a museum devoted to him?

Salinas and its valley are the backdrop of much of his fiction, which makes The Pearl's Mexican coast a rare departure. A national center in his name stands on the town's Main Street.

Which offer about the great pearl does the doctor make in The Pearl, putting Kino on his guard?

To lock it in his safe is the doctor's helpful suggestion. Kino declines, and the doctor watches his eyes to see where in the hut they flick.

After rejecting the local offers in The Pearl, where does Kino decide he must go to sell his pearl?

To the capital, a place he fears, is where Kino resolves to carry the pearl. Juan Tomás warns that he has defied the whole system he lives under, not just a few dealers.

Where do Juana and the baby hide in The Pearl while Kino creeps down toward the trackers' camp?

In a cave on the mountainside, above the pool where the trackers stop for the night, Juana waits with the baby. Kino strips off his white clothes so he can creep down unseen.

The Pearl's author won a Pulitzer for which earlier novel about a Dust Bowl family's trek west?

The Grapes of Wrath follows the Joad family, Oklahoma tenant farmers forced off their land in the drought years. Its epic sprawl could hardly be further from The Pearl's brief, fable-like telling.

Unlike the stone and plaster town nearby, Kino's neighbors in The Pearl live in houses made of what?

Brush houses shelter the fishing families on the shore, a short walk from a town of stone, plaster and fancy gardens. News moves between the two worlds at astonishing speed.

The aging priest in The Pearl is said to regard Kino's people, whatever their age, as what?

Children is how the priest thinks of his flock, and he treats them that way. Hearing of the pearl, he cannot recall whether he ever married Kino or baptized his baby.