Diamond Cuts Glass

Diamonds Index

Uncut Diamonds

Hardness
There are a number of methods of measuring hardness of minerals and other materials. One is to use a scratch test. There is a well-known scale of hardness as measured by scratching, known as Moh's Scale, which lists diamonds at 10, corundum (ruby and sapphire) at 9, topaz at 8, quartz at 7, feldspar at 6, and apatite at 5. Glass can have an almost infinite range of compositions, and as such, it's hardness is quite variable, but can generally be reckoned as about 5.5.
Moh's scale is only a comparative scale, but it uses fairly common materials, and at each step, the next material up the scale is capable of scratching the its lower neighbour. It's easy to see from this that there must be very many materials which will scratch or cut glass.

Urban Myth
It seems to have become an urban myth that only diamond can cut glass, therefore anything that can cut glass must be a diamond. The perpetuation of this myth really says more about the infinite stupidity of which people are capable!

Misleading Dealers and Advertising
One of the reasons why this senseless myth still remains is dishonest traders. Many dealers and traders, offering imitation diamonds, attempt to mislead their target market with such claims as "It Even Cuts Glass!". Actually, what motivated us to write this particular information page for our website was an advert by somebody called Monark Diamonds of Knightsbridge in London, making precisely the claim we have just mentioned, plus a few more besides, and all without stating what they were actually selling.

It Even Cuts Glass - So What?
As a consumer, your reaction whenever you see a claim such as this, should be "So what?". Any trader making such a claim, especially if they give it prominence as a selling point, obviously have so little else of merit they can say about their goods, that they have to resort to attempting to baffle you with bullshit.

Diamond 4C's Tour - Next Stop - Colour