Tourmaline in / on Quartz (ex Rolando Gioia Collection)

Item Description

Several prismatic, very dark green (mostly black) Tourmaline crystals measuring up to 4.1 cm are associated with Smoky Quartz crystals plus minor Albite and Muscovite to create this attractive display specimen. The Tourmalines are not only growing on the Quartz, but several of them are partially included within the Quartz crystals. When strongly backlit, you can see a slight amount of green around the edges of the Tourmalines, but they are nearly opaque. Interestingly, they show a bit of a "cat's eye" effect when rotated in the light, which is not common for darker Tourmaline crystals like this. A few imperfections keep the piece from being damage free, but this is more of an oddity / curiousity as it's not your typical Brazilian Tourmaline and Quartz specimen, this one is more exotic and certainly different. From the collection of Rolando Gioia (a contributor to new definitive book on Brazilian minerals: "Minerais e Pedras Preciosas do Brasil").