Smithsonite (Robertson Coll.)

Item Description

Cute bi-colored sprays of sea-green and oxide-tinted, pointed, rounded, rice-grain smithsonite crystals richly and aesthetically cover both sides of the distinctively different rolling two-sided crust. The hefty creamy matrix has glassy sections and there are oxide-coated pseudo-hexagonal appearing crystals, suggesting the matrix is cerussite. Ex Kay Robertson Collection # 1038. Her children acquired this from the Shale's in 1958 as a Christmas gift! Kay is a prominent California collector, who specialized in European classics (see the article in the March-April, 2007 Mineralogical Record and the 50+ page article in the German Magazine "Mineralien Welt" November-December 2017). A showy and rich combination smithsonite from Tsumeb. There are other secondary copper minerals also present.