Linarite

Unknown Owner

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An important, very large specimen for the locality of bright blue, lustrous linarite crystals to nearly 1 cm, laying flat on a starkly contrasting matrix plate. Note the 1840-dated label! This is a very significant specimen that, because of that date, places it among the earliest authenticated specimens of linarite from this district (I am comparing this to a well known specimen sold by Bryce Wright to the BMNH in 1843, now in the Lindsay Greenbank collection, which was said by the BMNH and by Richard Barstow to be the earliest documented Cumberland linarite). This would seem to have come out even earlier, and it is frankly a beautiful piece as well. The date and crystal habit/style seems to indicate that the origin of this piece is the same as Greenbank's, Roughton Gill (mined by the Saxons during Elizabethan times long before!), rather than from the later-producing Red Gill Mine which also became known for linarite of a different habit in later years. The size is also unusual for either locality, for a Cumberland linarite specimen.