Detailed information
Species
Fluorite, Quartz, Baryte
Dimensions
74 x 90 x 32
mm
Weight
134 g
Locality
La Barre Mine, Saint-Jacques-d'Ambur Pontgibaud, Puy-de-Dôme Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, France
Condition
No recorded repairs
La Barre mine at Saint-Jacques-d'Ambur in Puy-de-Dôme, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, France is world-renowned for its beautiful zoned Fluorite crystals. These are usually seen as single detached cubic crystals, or small crystal aggregates rather than matrix pieces. This small cabinet specimen is an exception to that, and an attractive one at that. Comprising a bed of finely crystallized Quartz, the Fluorite forms an 'island' made up of cuboid blocks, or crystals, upon a slightly raised area of Quartz. The Fluorite crystals are not all simple cubes, but some 'L'-shaped blocks, and others stacked, like buildings in a hillside village. The Fluorite is mostly pale grey in colour, but with thin paler outer layers, with the larger 'L'-shaped crystal being amber coloured with a grey outer zone. Some of the smaller crystals protruding from the edge of the specimen are totally transparent, but most of the pale grey crystals are opaque. All are in excellent condition with sharply defined crystal edges. Alongside the raised Fluorite crystals are several small cream coloured bladed Baryte crystals. This piece does not have the intensity of colour and sharpness of zoning that some smaller specimens do, but it is beautiful in its own right and presents extremely well.