Azurite with Malachite

Item Description

This is a large showy plate of lustrous, curving azurite crystals piled in a thick carpet upon malachite matrix. It is big, showy, colorful, and probably not expensive here. It is mostly intact with just a few small spots of damage. It comes from a find of the early 2000s, which (mostly) came to and premiered in Tucson in a truckload delivery at the main show of one of those years. To be honest, it looks a lot like circa-1900 Bisbee material! At the time, it caused quite a lot of consternation as tables of this material were released for quick sale (by your truly, in an old booth there, after purchasing it from Ken Roberts on his late return from China). I remember a lot of well known Arizona collectors coming over and practically crying, at how similar it looked to Bisbee material; whereas other people were happy to get gorgeous azurites for much lower prices than Arizona or Tsumeb azurite. There are subtle differences, however. To this day, we see some of this now-old Chinese material turn up again, optimistically labelled as Bisbee.