Chalcedonized

Part of speech: verb, adjective

Definitions

1. Transformed into the fine, waxy, microcrystalline quartz known as chalcedony, often through gradual mineral replacement of other material
2. Having been turned into a variety of silica with a translucent, waxy luster, as when fossil wood or shell is replaced by chalcedony
3. Made into or changed to chalcedony, a banded or cryptocrystalline form of quartz, through a process of mineral alteration over time

Etymology: Chalcedony is a fine-grained quartz with a waxy luster, and "chalcedonized" describes rock or wood whose original material has been replaced, or infilled, by that silica over time. The verb is built from "chalcedony" plus the suffix "-ize", which turns a noun into a verb meaning "to make into" or "to become." The base noun goes back to Late Latin "chalcedonius," itself borrowed from Greek "chalkēdōn," the name of a precious stone, and its ultimate origin is uncertain, though the city of Chalcedon on the Bosphorus is often linked to it. Geologists use the word for a process called chalcedonization, in which silica-rich groundwater gradually fills the pores and cavities of a rock, or replaces the cellular structure of buried plant matter, so that the original form survives as a solid mineral cast. Petrified wood is the classic example, where a log's grain can remain visible even though every fibre has been swapped for quartz.