This is a ballbuster aqua. And, you know I normally don't get excited about big single gem crystals. this thing GLOWS and has the juiciest deepest richest blue color I chacteristic from the famous Medina pocket of 1997. Well, ok, all the good ones really had equivalent color, truth be told - a remarkable consistency among the pocket contents. Most folks consider this the most important find of gem quality aquamarine in a single pocket, since the 1940s find of the style of the "Pioneer Aqua" in Brazil. This piece I can recommend because, although it doesn't COST six figures, the quality is every bit as good as what you can ever hope to get from the find and so you do not sacrifice quality at all to buy this one as opposed to waiting for one of the few bigger ones to resurface; they remain uniquely recognizable in the beryl world as being from a unique and special pocket; the history and pedigree are good; and the piece is just plain gorgeous. The strength and the problem with the material from this find is that it is all gemmy and gem rough. It is glassy, and better in person in that regard. so the good part is that makes them beautiful. the bad part is that makes them "cutters" of obvious and easily realized value to the miners. Thus, Wayne Thompson, when he bought the specimens from the pocket in brazil and took them to market in tucson in 1997, had to pay gem rough prices for them ($10 per carat for good quality aqua, adding a premium for the large potential size of the stones, and this would have cost him at the time $15550 plus some 10-20% premium charge, In brazil). What wayne bought is what was saved from destruction and use in the gem trade. They cut big, beautiful stones. Few survived for our market, and a certain percentage of those have even been cut since for the large rough in them. This one was, he says, the best of the "smaller" aquas from the find (there were a few that were 1 foot in length, and these go for 100k and up nowadays). this one was sold to Ed David, at that time.