Tuesday Update – Europe (Germany & Norway)

WELL, like the meteorites in last Friday’s update we were always going to have to come back down to Earth and in my case that was at the front of a four vehicle shunt on the way in to work this morning! Thankfully, my car was the least affected, but the quarry lorry managed to do a pretty good job of reshaping a VW transporter van into a hatchback. 

Looking through classic European minerals is always a great distraction and that has certainly been the case today, as we serve up a bumper selection, covering Germany and Norway. Our Norwegian suite is predominantly made up of lesser known classics, but with a sprinkling of world-class Zircon crystals from Seiland Island in the Arctic north of the country. The absence of Native Silver is simply because the great Kongsberg mine usually features during our precious metal, or silver updates, and to have so many great localities represented by some of the less well-known species really calls for them to be listed online for all to see.

Germany on the other hand, is blessed with a far greater diversity of species, many of which are magnificently crystallized. Some of these have been known for centuries and were instrumental in the advancements of mineralogy as a science in the early 19th century, others are more recent discoveries.

Of the relatively ‘modern’ finds, the golden, or amber-coloured Baryte crystals from Pöhla-Tellerhäuser mine in Erzgebirge, Saxony were a shockingly fine discovery during the 1970s and 1980s and the larger of the two specimens we list today is, without doubt, one of the finest individual crystals from that important find.

Recently, I have been busy searching through out database for weird and wonderful offerings. Next week we focus our attention once again on rare species, but many of these are things that we have not offered for a very long time, or at all. These will be revealed on Tuesday.

Have a great week.

Please note: Today's featured specimens are situated at both our US and UK showrooms.