Blog for Amber- Andzia's Amber Jewelry

Scent of Amber- Recent Article in Polish American Journal

Dear Andzia,

I see so many fragrances, body lotions and soaps with amber or amber oil listed as one of the main ingredients. Is Baltic amber used in all these products?

Baltic amber, in its raw, untouched natural form will give off an aroma similar to pine sap. The best way to obtain this smell is burning thin shavings of amber directly over glowing charcoals. Burning amber gives off a sharp pungent piney aroma--extremely strong and very harsh. Amber was burned in the Middle Ages to ward off the Black Plague and it just might possibly have helped the people feel better, if only for a short time. Inhaling smoke from a pile of burning amber would most likely make one cough almost uncontrollably and bring tears to the eyes--possibly conducive to clearing impurities out of one’s system.

In ancient times peoples burned amber for a number of different reasons. It has been said that the Chinese peoples burned copious amounts of amber as a symbol of their unending supply of wealth. Since amber was an exotic luxury good, it was an extreme status symbol to show that their money could literally go up in smoke and not worry them one little bit.

As far as beauty products, perfumes, soaps and the like that we see on today’s market, the amber used for the “top notes” is manufactured from different materials --none of them actually amber as we know it. “Amber”compounds (the good ones) are primarily made from the resins of benzoic trees (spicy, gummy Asian trees) and labdanum (rock rose) with essential oils and fragrances added to it. Almost all of these products come from places such as Sumatra and India, where hand intensive labor is required to harvest the spices, herbs and special blends of ingredients.

Of course, the manufacturers of such products keep their blends top secret. If you have ever used a high end product with “amber” as an ingredient, you most likely have enjoyed warm notes of a woodsy, earthy very rich fragrance---telling yourself this is exactly what amber must smell like.

At the opposite end, if you are using a relatively inexpensive product with an ingredient labeled as “amber” you are most likely smelling a cheap synthetic version of any number of other synthetics combinations and imitations such as vanilla, jasmine and the like. Possibly quite enjoyable but definitely not real amber by any means.

A decade ago, one could actually find products in Poland that were made with amber as an ingredient. Amber has many positive properties and Poles, from ancient to modern times, have always been both creative and clever in using those properties for well being. In today’s world amber is very scarce and very expensive, making products with this marvelous gem almost impossible to obtain or, much more importantly, to properly authenticate.

You may ask me a question about amber by emailing:

Your question may be answered in The Polish American Journal, online here at Blog for Amber, in Amberjewelry.com's Fan page on Facebook, or by personal email.  Please understand that due to time constraints not all questions will be answered, but I will do my best to answer the more interesting ones.

AmberModa at Tucson gem Show 2010

A peak into the AmberModa booth in Tucson Feb 2010

No visit to GJX is complete without a stop in the International Pavilion.   Baltic Amber bracelet by Ambermoda When I walked in the “annex,” my attention was immediately grabbed by the Ambermoda booth. I’m a big fan of amber (ask me sometime about my huge knuckle-busting amber ring), and Polish designer Mariusz Gliwinski has some of the best I’ve ever seen. He mounts exquisite Baltic amber in some spectacular and eye-catching settings. I was amazed by the variety and beauty of his work. The one piece on display at the Ambermoda booth that I covet above all the others was a gorgeous black amber cuff bracelet. Black amber is considered “less desirable” amber, but you’d never know it from this piece. Gliwinski mounted squares of black amber in a silver cuff with diamonds with a stunning result. The bracelet is now on my “probably unattainable” wish list. I think I’ll remind my family that I have a rather big birthday coming up. And if they really love me . . .

See ya ‘round the shows!

Karla Rosenbusch Managing Editor of Tucson Show Guide

Amberfishers

Fishing for Amber in the Sea in Winter on the Vistula Spit

by Eyrk Popkiewicz

 

       Fishing for amber in 1964   --Irena Skibowska

During the winter storms, amber has greater buoyancy in the sea, because the sea’s salinity is increased (and thus the seawater’s displacement). It is then that the Baltic storms easily wash up the Gold of the North onto the shore together with twigs, known as “flotsam.” Falling snow quickly covers the entire beach together with the amber nuggets. All you need is to take a hoe (like a potato digger) and break through the snow and the thin layer of frozen twigs to get to the nuggets. (When the twigs rot, they produce heat, which is why they only freeze on the surface.)

When the storms came, the people who would wait for the amber in the quiet of the dunes would light up bonfires to keep warm. They would also help themselves to liquor to withstand the wind, cold and humidity. They would use a wash net to fish for amber in the winter; a hoop with a mesh fixed on a pole as long as 6m; pine poles with a double hoop were the best, because the mesh fixed to them would not wear through as fast. The floe which appeared on the sea would often be washed up onto the shore. Sometimes the twigs with amber got hidden under the ice at the very shore so axes were used to make holes in the ice.

Next, the amber fishers would take landing nets with long poles, known as sztyce, to get to the amber lying deep on the sea floor. In the winter, when the temperature held at about -20^oC for a dozen or more days, the floe would form a beach of ice stretching as much as 200 metres into the sea. If a storm came at this time or shortly after the freezing weather, the floe would pile up by the shore, forming high ice hills of up to 5 metres. Sometimes flotsam with amber would gather at the foot of these ice hills. Then the amber fishers would climb onto the edge of such a hill and reach for the amber mixed with the twigs with their nets. Sometimes they would slip and have dangerous falls in the process. If the sea was calm and there was no floe in front of the ice hill, such falls would usually end in a mere bath in icy waters and slight bruises for the amber fishers.

However, if the weather was stormy and the floe came hitting the icy scarp, it could be very, very dangerous. All this time, the amber fishers had to skilfully and reflectively manoeuvre the landing net in order not to lose it. If the pole got in between two chunks of ice moved by the undulating sea, it would be crushed and cut off instantly. When the sea was calm and the floe was very large, several people would ride it out into the sea but only as far as they were able to push themselves off by reaching down to the sea floor with their net poles. When riding the floe, they would also use anchors to immobilise the floating ice, but also to drift on it along the shoreline. They would use their landing nets to fish the twigs from the sea floor out onto the floe. Next they would rummage through the twigs and pick out the amber. Every now and then they would push the heavy wet twigs back into the sea from the ice sheet, in order to maintain the stability of their ice-raft. Any tilting of the floe put the people on it in danger of falling into the sea, which would often mean death in the icy water.

The locals tell stories of how, in the 1960s amber was extracted together with flotsam from the depths of seaside Mikoszewski Lake to its frozen surface. Oral reports indicate that no large nuggets were found, because the twigs had come from the sea and were previously sifted through. Sometimes, the twigs would form large heaps on the ice, which would bend under their weight and that spot would be soon flooded by freezing water.

Recent winters have been mild and therefore less abounding in amber. Perhaps soon a more severe winter will come to allow better amber fishing. Who knows, maybe even this winter?

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We're gearing up to start a series of 15th Anniversary celebrations & this is just small taste of what is to come. Spring is a time of reinvention & this year, we get the sense that there is a huge appetite for positive energy & color in what most days feels like a world gone mad. 

When we get the chance to slow down for a second & savor the tremendous gifts Mother Nature has given us, such small treasures can help us be filled, if only for a moment, with a spirit of calm & of patience. Amber inspires. 

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