Bournonite (''cogwheels'') on Quartz

Item Description

Bournonite is a relatively rare copper lead antimony sulfosalt mineral, and some of the most desirable examples are the famous "cogwheel" habit crystals. It's fair to say that In the modern era of mineral collecting, Bolivia has produced some of the finest examples of Bournonite in the world. I've seen some really impressive specimens of this minerals from the Machacamarca Mine over the last 20+ years. In fact one piece that we sold was so good that it ended up on the cover of the May-June 2009 issue of the Mineralogical Record. This is a showy and fine quality cabinet sized piece featuring a few attractive, sharp, metallic, silvery-grey color, tabular "cogwheel"-shaped crystal group of Bournonite aesthetically sitting atop sculptural grey Quartz matrix. The largest Bournonite crystal measures 2.7 cm across. This specimen is from a find in 2012 in Bolivia. No major damage that I can see, and it certainly better than the majority I've handled from Machacamarca in recent years, especially from an aesthetic point of view. This piece was priced at $1,650 in the inventory.