The earliest known opal artifacts were uncovered by famous anthropologist by the name of Louis Leaky in a cave in Kenya dating back to around 4000BC. From then on opal discoveries progressed similarly to the ways that diamond, emerald, ruby and sapphire were produced. As early humans found opals and communities developed, gems became symbols of wealth. Since the late 1800’s, Australia has dominated opal production with 97% of the global output. Opals of differing qualities occur in more than twenty other countries around the world but are not quite the quality of the Australian sedimentary opal.