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Identity HelpAmber Unknown Locality

2nd Jul 2017 01:23 UTCSteve Hardinger 🌟 Expert

It is possible to assign locality to an amber specimen with some reasonable level of confidence if the specimen's locality is unknown? No I don't have a photo; I'm ask a general question.

2nd Jul 2017 04:45 UTCOwen Lewis

The short answer is no, Steve. By the chemistry, it is possible to differentiate much of the amber that by continent or even sun-continental regions but that is about it. The key problem is that in addition to the plant groups (not necessarily varied tidily by geography), that first set the chemistry, the chemistry is markedly altered further by time and conditions of storage over the millions of years it takes for natural resins to acquire the characteristics of amber.


A few useful guidelines are these:

- There is no true amber from S.America. 'Amber' from Colombia is copal - resin usually not more than 30,000 years' old that has not yet acquired the hardness and stability of amber.

- Similarly, there is no true amber known to come from anywhere in Africa. African 'amber' specimens in the great museums of the world were discredited and reclassified as very young copal by accurate radio carbon dating work done in the 1980's.

- S.E. Asia and Australasia (esp. Malaysia and Indonesia) produce mainly copal (local names dammar or gum) but there is production of some amber too.

- Mexican and Caribbean amber is chemically distinctive from amber formed in the states bordering the Baltic Sea and southerly through Germany, Poland and Ukraine. Both amber and copal are found in the Dominican Republic.

- 80% of the world's production of amber comes from the Baltic region.

- The amber trade has a murky past. There was a history in the 20th century of the importation of both copal and amber from the Americas to blend with amber recovered in the Baltic states (incl Russia, Poland and E.Germany. This has essentially ceased since 1989.
 
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