Monazite-Ce (color change crystals)

Item Description

Monazite gets its name from the Greek word "monazein", which means "to be alone", in allusion to its isolated crystals and their rarity when first found. This is a well crystallized, rather rare, specimen consisting of sharp, lustrous, translucent crystals of orange-pink, "butterfly"-twinned crystals of Monazite-Ce with small twinned black Cassiterite and deep reddish-black Hubnerite on Quartz matrix. The Monazite crystals actually perform a color change in different lighting ranging from orange-pink to a white/yellow depending upon the light source. Monazite is usually found in granitic pegmatites, but these crystals are found in hydrothermal tin veins where is an absolute absence of Thorium (usually a trace element in Monazite). It is very difficult to obtain any specimens of this incredibly beautiful and rare phosphate, especially from Bolivia like this. This piece is from the same mine for which this material was discovered along the Contacto and San Jose veins in this mine and was first described by Sam Gordon and Mark Bandy. It is so unbelievably rare to find matrix specimens of Monazite-Ce from any locality in Bolivia or anywhere else in the world. This species is often dark and opaque from most localities and rarely bright like these.