Detailed information
Species
Fluorite, Quartz
Dimensions
80 x 59 x 29
mm
Locality
Shangbao Mine, Leiyang County Hengyang Prefecture Hunan Province, China
Condition
No recorded repairs
Since the turn of the century China has produced some of the most magnificent crystallized Fluorite specimens the world has seen, but from a growing list of different mines each with their own distinctive features. The Shangbao mine, a high temperature skarn-type polymetallic deposit in Hunan Province, China, is renowned for wonderfully geometric cubo-octahedral crystals, where the main cubic faces are joined with highly distinctive wide bevelled edges. This lovely small cabinet-sized specimen exhibits cubic-dodecahedral faced crystals of Fluorite measuring to 1.8 cm across on a crystallized Quartz matrix. The crystals of Fluorite are gemmy and colourless on their cubic faces and frosted along their bevelled edges, giving them a lovely character, with flashes of internal purple colour. Despite being quite a pale coloured specimen the crystallographic qualities of these Fluorite crystals is wonderful. Ex Günter Ertle Collection.