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Pearl
It acquired its name from the ancient Romans, who wore elongated pearls as ear pendants
that they called pirla, a slang diminutive of pira ("pear"). The pearl is an
organic gem grown within oysters and a few other mollusks. It is formed when a foreign
object, like a tiny stone, makes its way into the mollusk's shell. Irritation caused
by the foreign particle makes the oyster form a secretion, called nacre, to cover it.
Nacre is the same material that forms the mollusk's shell. When dried, the particle again
irritates the animal, so it begins to secrete again; as thousands of layers of nacre coat
the intruder, a pearl is formed. The process takes anywhere from four months to seven
years — the longer the process, the bigger the pearl. "Cultured" pearls are
those in which people, rather than nature, implant the intruding material, and the
mollusks are cared for in a protective environment (a pearl farm) while coating process
goes on. Nearly all pearls available today are cultured, and only one out of four
cultivated oysters lives to create a marketable pearl. Natural pearls are very rare (and
valuable!), so the word "pearl" should be assumed as "cultured pearl"
unless otherwise noted.
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