Chalcopyrite on Calcite - rare locale

Item Description

A large, stout Chalcopyrite crystal dominates the very center of this piece and is accompanied by several other Chalcopyrite crystals. The large crystal in the middle of the piece is is a brassy yellow, lustrous, modified tetrahedron measuring 2 cm on edge. There are at least a dozen other well-formed to subhedral crystals associated with the large crystals and distributed around the and in the off-white, crystalline Calcite matrix. The piece sits well on its own to show off the large, well-formed Chalcopyrite at the center. The contrast of geometry of chalcopyrite to the more stark and large calcite it sits on, is dramatic. this is an old specimen, surely, from the era when Korean minerals were briefly available on the world market in the mid 1900s. We considered if this was a chalcopyrite-coated tetrahedrite, but it seems to be chalcopyrite as the color matches traces in the matrix, and a small break in back lets you see it is golden, not black, within. A fine, important locality specimen!