Tellurium

$5,000.00

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Native Tellurium is a very rare mineral, particularly in visible masses or crystals. It was first described from a gold mine at Kleinschlatten in Transylvania - now known as Fata Baii (Facebánya), Zlatna, Alba Co., Romania - in 1798 but tellurium-bearing compounds had been discovered there many years earlier. Specimens from this, the Type Locality region, are rare and usually small, making this cabinet-sized display specimen a very significant example comparable to those historic specimens in Eastern European museums. The Native Tellurium is a silver-white metallic mineral and associated with it on this specimen is Krennerite, a gold silver telluride that displays perfect cleavage. These tellurium minerals occur along an open fracture surface upon finely crystallized Quartz. Some of the Native Tellurium is massive, where it was squeezed within the fracture/veinlet before it was split open, but under magnification small rounded, or equant crystals can be seen along with areas that look like molten metal. Krennerite occurs as bladed microcrystals of a similar silver-white colour. A rare, historically significant specimen from the marvelous collection put together by brothers Martin and Michael Günther (1951-2007 & 1956-2021).