Topaz (gemmy crystal) (classic material)

Item Description

A beautiful example of these famous Topaz crystals from Tanakami-yama (erroneously labeled as coming from Tamagama, Iwate Prefecture). The sharp, well-formed, lustrous, gemmy, colorless prismatic crystal is accompanied by a smaller "side car" crystal with an incomplete and partially etched termination, free of matrix. Specimen weight is 25.8 grams. This classic granitic pegmatite locality has produced what are arguably the most well-known Topaz crystals from any locality in Japan, but the area has been mined out, and virtually nothing is found these days. Formerly in the Vince Rizzo collection.
Ex George Loud Collection No. 5015; 397 JA.3. George (born August 16, 1942) is a well-known mineral collector from Washington, DC and South Carolina respectively, and was a patent lawyer by trade for over 50 years. He assembled one of the great mineral collections in the U.S., comprising worldwide specimens, and in later years he sold the worldwide specimens to focus on minerals of the United States, specifically locality suites with an emphasis on amazing representation of species while still maintaining fine quality. The specimens remarkably range from micros to all the way up to large cabinets in size. We recently acquired most of his impressive 9000+ piece collection, and the VAST majority of these pieces will be offered here in the auctions, as we feel that everyone deserves and equal opportunity at acquiring these important, well-documented and fine quality specimens for their collections.
See: https://mineralogicalrecord.com/biographies_labels/george-loud for more information