Acanthite w/ Quartz (Panczner Coll.)

Item Description

A highly sculptural, 3-dimensional, 360-degree, arborescent, shrub-like thumbnail cluster of unusual acanthite crystals attached to a bit of quartz matrix from the historic silver mines at Guanajuato. The lustrous metallic pseudo-cubic and pseudo-octahedral crystals are strangely etched with some cubic crystals dramatically accented by hoppered faces. Ex Bill Panczner Collection and acquired in the 1960s to 1980s. The piece is from his award winning competition thumbnails. Bill was the first Curator of Earth Science at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum in 1974 and the author of the 1987 book Minerals of Mexico. It is the most thorough summary of the subject. Read about Bill in the Mineralogical Record Biographical Archive at: https://mineralogicalrecord.com/labels.asp?colid=841. An exceptional thumbnail acanthite of this style from Guanjuato. See the article in the 2016 Mineralogical Record Mexico-VII Special Issue, Vol. 47, No. 5.