Rhodochrosite on Quartz (ex. Marion Stuart Coll.)

Item Description

The Oppu Mine remains, long after its closure, the classic and most well known source of rhodochrosite from Japan. For manyyears, I had bought and sold little pieces of botryoidal rhodo, with the occasional crystallized specimen as well. However, in the Marion Stuart collection about 10 years ago, I saw this fantastic large specimen of botryoidal rhodochrosite covering large, fat quartz crystals. The piece sold before I could make up my mind to buy it, but then I saw it again in a dealer's stock a few years ago and finally obtained it. To this day, for this style, I still have not seen another like this for overall size and quality. Although one cannot say when it was mined, these specimens came out prior to WWII and I have seen many dated to the late 1800s from famous old collections in museums now. On the market, for collectors, cabinet sized Japan rhodochrosite specimens are vanishingly few and far between. Valued $2500-3000. ex. Marion Stuart collection (she was an heir to the Carnation Milk fortune and collected minerals actively, loaning many out for display to museums in the 1970s-1980s)