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Mineral Specimens with Elbaite
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7.3 x 5.3 x 4.9 cm. This is a massive 295-gram rubellite crystal from a lesser-known mining district by today's production. It has a most unusual magenta color in person, with a touch of blue or purple you do not normally see in rubellite from Brazil. The piece has a beautiful display face on the front, and you can see the diagonal lepidolite blades attached on back, arching over from behind, at this angle. The termination is most unusual, basically a 1mm black, matte cap atop an otherwise normal core.
3.5 x 0.7 x 0.6 cm. This beautiful, doubly-terminated "gem pencil" has a striking color combination with a very thin bluish-purple "cap" that grades into a gem quality colorless ("Achroite") zone which gives way to a stunning teal/blue color that mixes into an inky purple color which ends with a virtually black (very dark purplish-blue color) at the base and has another colorless termination on the other end. For a smaller Tourmaline crystal, this one is very unique and eye-catching. To the best of my knowledge, the find of these crystals was very limited and I have not seen any of them available from the Pakistani dealers for months now. From Gochalay, near Shengus.
One of the finest rhodizite specimens I have seen in recent years, due to the rich color, excellent lustre, and sharpness of the crystal (which is 1.6 cm across). This material is rhodizite, though unusually Rb-rich, and is not the same as Londonite: the relatively Cs-dominant analogue of Rhodizite named after Dr. David London. This specimen was exchanged from Madagascar specialist Dr. Federico Pezzotta. From anybody else, I would have gone ahead and labeled it as Londonite as they tend to be more lustrous and yellow than the pure rhodizites. 5 x 4.3 x 3.9 cm
11.0 x 3.1 x 2.1 cm. A striking, unrepaired, cabinet tourmaline specimen from recent finds at the Pederneira Mine. As you can see, the upper, gemmy and lustrous portion of the green body is distinctly curved, as the crystal was broken by pocket forces and then re-grew. The lower portion of the main crystal and the two sidecar crystals have pink interiors, making these watermelon tourmalines. The purple lepidolites sprinkled around the base are a very nice accent. The main crystal is essentially pristine. One end of the small, 1.3 cm, isolated is terminated, while the other end is broken. The three, intergrown crystals at the base are terminated. This is a dramatic, larger, watermelon tourmaline from this renowned locale.
3.1 x 0.7 x 0.6 cm. A rare and very fine sceptered tourmaline from the much less well-known Aracuai area of Minas Gerais. The gemmy and lustrous stalk is a gorgeous, bottle-green and the interesting scepter "cap" is bi-colored, green and black. Exquisite and pristine. Weighs 7.45 carats.
4.3 x 1.2 x 0.8 cm. A beautiful, gemmy and lustrous, richly striated, bottle-green tourmaline with a striking, lightly etched, olive-green, pyramidal termination from recent finds at the Pederneira Mine. One side of this pristine specimen is sprinkled with tiny tourmalines and what appears to be a 7 mm, doubly terminated, flattened, hexagonal quartz crystal or a bertrandite crystal near the base. Classic Pederneira material.
5.1 x 1.5 x 0.9 cm. A very nice cluster of three parallel-growth, gemmy and lustrous, watermelon tourmalines crystals from recent finds at the Pederneira Mine. The large, vibrant, cranberry-red/pink core is sheathed in and capped by beautiful, teal-blue tourmaline. The lightly etched, olive-green, pyramidal terminations are striking and the bit of accenting quartz is a nice touch. Complete-all-around, the contacting on one side is out of sight. A beautiful and highly representative watermelon tourmaline from this noted locale.
4.7 x 2.3 x 1.7 cm. Despite the fact that the Tourmaline group comprises more than a dozen species, and Tourmalines occur in virtually every color of the rainbow, yellow is one of the most rare and highly sought after colors for specimens. This specimen is one of the most interesting, unique and uncharacteristic Tourmalines that I have seen from virtually any world locality. This specimen was in the collection of Richard Kosnar, who purchased it from New Jersey mineral dealer Rick Smith in the early 1980s. It features a pair of very sharp, highly lustrous, thin, prismatic, GEM/gemmy, multicolored crystals of Tourmaline on a single very slightly smoky color Quartz crystal with minor Albite. Matrix specimens from Stak Nala aren't terribly common, but it's the coloration of the crystals that makes this piece so unusual. The smaller of the Tourmaline crystals has a rich olive-green to black color at the base with a bright pink termination, but the larger crystal has a very unique yellow zone spanning over 2 cm of this 4.7 cm crystal with the same olive-green and pink zones as the smaller one. Another impressive aspect of this piece is the fact that the terminations are highly lustrous, and not at all dull like so many Tourmalines from Stak Nala.
2.7 x 1.0 x 1.0 cm. A very nice thumbnail Pederneira watermelon tourmaline. The rich pink core is sheathed in a very thin rind of green. A gemmy and lustrous, beautiful, teal-blue zone lies beneath the lustrous, dark purple termination. Complete-all-around and very nearly pristine. The unretouched backlit photo highlights the gorgeous colors and gemminess. A classic and pretty Pederneira watermelon tourmaline.
8.7 x 2.8 x 2.1 cm. Classic Paprok material. This beautiful specimen is a sharp gemmy lustrous cluster of two sub-parallel crystals. The crystals are in great shape with very little and barely noticeable edge wear. They are a pastel pink color with pastel green tips, very subtly colored. The pastel colors are not weak and washed out, per se…they just are a classic color combination from this locale, unique really compared to other finds. Very 3-dimensional in person.
10.5 x 4.5 x 4 cm. This hefty and unusual cluster of large, robust tourmaline we call the "pillars" because it looks like two pillars holding up an ancient Middle Eastern temple. It features a large stalk of highly lustrous tourmaline on the leading edge, with a very gemmy tip. Backing it up is a thick, almost cylindrical crystal, that reaches above the gem termination by a hair. Both are contacted on the bottom, and the larger one is contacted atop, making for a matte termination on either end (the crystals grew in a pocket to the full extent possible, in other words, culminating and microcrystallizing at either end where it grew against something flat). Again, the lead crystal is very gemmy in its upper portion and from the front you see a fine termination.
9.3 x 8.7 x 5.3 cm. A fine, lustrous, striated, prismatic bi-colored crystal of pink and green Tourmaline with a rarely seen unusual "white cap" on bladed Albite matrix. This is definitely one of the more unique Tourmalines that I have seen from any locality, and the "white cap" could be caused by included pocket clay when the crystal formed. The crystal itself measures 4.3 cm long, and passes light when backlit. The quality is good, and the crystal is almost suspended on the matrix in a way that it appears to be floating. Tourmalines are so diverse, and yet, this is the first "white cap" Tourmaline crystal that I can remember seeing from any locality. Ex. Brian Kosnar Collection.
10.5 x 9.1 x 5.9 cm. This specimen is a beautiful arrangement of truly gem-blue indicolite tourmaline nestled in a glistening matrix of purple, sparkling lepidolite. The Pederneira, in its recent heyday of the early 2000's , briefly gave the market a flood of good tourmaline matrix specimens (most repaired, but acceptable in context). Even with the quantity produced, each pocket was different and when you really get down to thinking about it, few of the finds were of blue tourmaline - and fewer yet on matrix. Matrix indicolites are in fact quite rare from any locale. This piece features 3 major and several minor crystals. The large central crystal is 8.6 x 1.3 x 1.3 cm, with a clean repair at midpoint. It is perfectly terminated and very gemmy and transparent. It has a totally freestanding termination. The forward-facing crystal, to its right, is 3 x 1.5 cm 1.2 cm and is doubly-terminated (the front termination is oddly rippled, but in an interesting manner; the back termination is matte and dull). The slender, totally gemmy crystal pointing to the left is actually 6 cm long, thought most of that length is hidden on the backside of the specimen and not visible from the front.
6.6 x 3.7 x 3.7 cm. This is an intense maroon-colored tourmaline crystal of extremely high quality for the locale, and was mined over a decade ago. It has the classic "siberite" color, a deep cranberry hue found seldom today. The crystal is complete-all-around and even has a little attached matrix in the backside. It has excellent lustre on the termination, which is also complete. Weighs 94 grams. Ex. Graw Collection.
5.6 x 2.2 x 2.0 cm. This is a classic, old style Himalaya tourmaline with extremely good glassiness and transparency to it (despite its thickness). It was found in the so-called Ralph Potter days, predating the modern era of business-oriented and systematic specimen mining here from the mid 1970s. The glassiness and transparent termination seen when looking downward are characteristics of the period. The crystal is complete-all-around, though there is a shallow ding on a back edge of the termination, and a few other small instances of edge wear on it. The green zone at the cap, intense from the sides, is surprisingly not so green when you look from the top, downward into the depth of the crystal. Weighs approximately 50 grams. Ex. Graw Collection.
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Rob Lavinsky, rob@irocks.com
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share specimen![Tourmaline (Var: Rubellite), Lepidolite from Araçuaí, Jequitinhonha valley, Minas Gerais, Southeast Region, Brazil [db_pics/mdpics/MD-275087a.jpg]](db_pics/mdpics/MD-275087a.jpg)
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