Diopside (uncommon locality)

Item Description

Here we have a rather hard-to-find specimen from the Jaipur area in Rajasthan, India. This piece is a sharp, well-formed, lustrous, deep green colored prismatic Diopside crystal free of matrix. The bottom of the crystal appears to be crudely re-crystallized ("re-healed"), so it's CLOSE to what I would call doubly-terminated, but not quite there. These crystals are incredibly distinctive, and do not resemble any other Diopsides I've seen from any other locality. For the most part, the piece is largely opaque, but with strong backlighting, you can get a bit of color to show through on the edges. No major damage, only some minor interrupted growth in spots, but really good quality and size for this obscure material that was mined decades ago. Specimen weight is 65.67 grams.
From the collection of Richard ("Rich") A. Kosnar, the well-known mineral collector and dealer from Colorado (1946-2007). He was the namesake for the rare zirconium phosphate, Kosnarite.