Malachite (rare historic specimen - not polished) (ex Kurt Hefendehl Collection)

Item Description

A large percentage of the old Malachites that you'll find from this historic copper deposit - where mining dates back a few centuries - were cut and polished to better show off their beautiful internal forms, but THIS piece is a notably rare UN-polished specimen preserving the beautiful natural botryoidal form. The piece is comprised of many fine quality botryoidal aggregates of a rich forest green hue, some of which have a gentle sparkly luster on the surface. A couple of the "balls" are contacted, revealing that they are actually hollow inside, leading me to believe that they might have formed as a secondary overgrowth on top of another mineral that later dissolved away. You almost never see these pieces on the market, especially in their natural form. A must have piece for any fan of secondary ore minerals, copper species, Russian minerals or worldwide Malachites. Valued around $1,800-$2,400 retail. From the collection of Kurt Hefendehl, a well-known German collector all over Europe with worldwide contacts to dealers and collectors. He started collecting seriously at the age of 14 and his great and varied worldwide collection reached over 6000 pieces. He was very active mineralogically until shortly before his passing in 2020 at the age of 82. Considering his collection had a large number of pieces, it still had an unusually high standard of quality from most worldwide localities. He particularly specialized in all classics as well as minerals of the Black Forest, where he spent much time collecting. His Black Forest and German subcollections went to his good friend Wolfgang Wendel. We at The Arkenstone have the privilege of offering the remainder of this great worldwide collection over the next two to three years through our various platforms.