Fluorite on Dolomite

Unknown Owner

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This bizarre specimen is from a very small mine, that I am told played out quickly and produced few specimens. I had never heard of it except for some small, inconsequential pieces a few years ago. What a distinct style! This piece, despite its size, is remarkably pristine. It is also a floater, complete all around, and even on the backside (where it broke from the pocket, and some later crystallization healed the wound). I have seen only 4 pieces from this mine, of this style, over several years. This is BY FAR the best one that I know of, and it must rank as one of the most dramatic Chinese fluorites around, I would think. It looks like a cluster of pagodas, even. The piece is a VIVID green color, as if you put food coloring into a normal fluorite by vacuum injection, and it positively glows when backlit. Our photos show it in normal lighting only, nothing fancy. In stronger lighting, it is entirely transparent. The whole display face, and all those outstanding gemmy cubes at the major octohedral points, is nearly pristine with just a few nearly invisible dings - if you look very closely. I consider this to be in remarkable condition, given its size and exposure in what was surely a narrow vein pocket. Out of all the thousands of Chinese fluorites we have seen, here is somethign entirely, uniquely, different. You can tell from the verbiage, I suspect, what I think of this piece. It was one of the previous owners' real prizes, purchased at the mining region in China in 2005.