Pachnolite on Cryolite (old - Type Locality for both) Chapman & Robertson Coll.

Item Description

Pachnolite and cryolite are rare halides and the famous and exctinct Ivigtut deposit is the Type Locality. Pachnolite is a dimorph of thomsenolite, another Type Locality rarity from here. Striking, sculptural boxwork areas of micro pachnolite crystals cover the top of the blocky massive cryolite matrix. The aluminum halides were mined to extract aluminum in the 1800s and early 1900s until more modern processes using bauxite ore made this deposit uneconomic to mine (and the waters had to be kept out at great expense as they went deeper, too). Formerly in the Ernest Chapman Collection, a well-known California collector who died in 1947. Ex Kay Robertson Collection # 6982 and acquired from Kristalle in July, 1973. The piece comes with a century-old A.E. Foote label glued to the back. 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). OLD-TIME specimens of this richness and combination quality are rare from here.