Cassiterite (antique locale)

Item Description

It is very difficult to find these classic Cassiterite pieces from the Ural Mountains in Russia today and they only come out of old collections as this one did (and another, before him, in all likelihood). They are classics of 1800s-era mineralogy, as well. This striking miniature consists of a dozen super lustrous pseudo-octahedral Cassiterite crystals from 0.5 to 1.7 cm in size, many of them twinned. They are a shiny, submetallic brown-black with lightly striated faces, good faces and sharp edges. The crystals are well defined and are distributed from end-to-end on the piece for great composition. Small patches of off-white Quartz crystal clusters composed of 1 to 3 mm crystals are in nice contrast to the Cassiterites. A very nice, old-time miniature for the locality, and rare for the species.