Modern Birthstone Chart
This list is the one most people are familiar with today. It was adopted as the official list of birthstones by the National Association of Jewelers in 1912. Though this set of birthstones is the most popular with modern jewelers, the Jeweler’s Association took several liberties in regards to traditional folklore and stone placement causing this chart to deviate from traditional birthstone charts. Their new chart switched the positions of the Aquamarine, Sapphire, Ruby, and Peridot to new months, and they replaced the semiprecious stones with the more expensive pearl and opal. These alterations had never occurred in western charts prior to this commodification of folklore.
So great and unusual were these alterations that when the Jeweler’s Association first released the revised chart many folklorists and lapidaries protested. Among them was George Fredrick Kunz, who strongly refuted the new chart as fakelore and marketeering.
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