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Originally Posted by Icelander
Or, perhaps, simply a well written book of popular scholarship on the subject?
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I don't know about "well written" but the standards for this seem to be George Frederick Kunz _The Curious Lore of Precious Stones_ (a 19th century work that Dover keeps in print) and Scott Cunningham _Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Crystal, Gem and Metal Magic_ (a more modern work aimed at the Wiccan community).
But keep in mind that premodern gems are basically classified only by color and transparency, so the meanings assigned will typically be the same as the meanings assigned to the color in the same tradition, and the overlap with modern conceptions of what gems are which may not be very good.