Inesite - image 1
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specimen video

Inesite

Unknown Owner
A superb specimen of the calcium-manganese-iron silicate Inesite from the famous and classic Kalahari manganese deposit at the N'Chwaning mines in Northern Cape Province, South Africa. Entirely covering a thin plate of creamy-white country rock is a solid crystallised 1 cm+ thick bed of salmon pink Inesite crystals, the terminations and surface of which is rich pinkish-scarlet. Lightly scattered over the Inesite terminations are sub-millimetre colourless to light grey glassy globules of Apophyllite. A showy specimen of Inesite from the N'Chwaning Mines.

Product details

Species
InesiteAbout Inesite →
SizeSmall Cabinet
Dimensions6.2 x 7.8 x 3.4 cm
Added on10/24/2024
Locality
South Africa, Northern Cape, N'Chwaning MinesRegional guide →

Known provenance

DateCollectorAcquisition price
—Unknown Owner$3,500.00
—Crystal ClassicsNot disclosed

Learn more

Mineral guide
Learn about Inesite
salmon-pink radiating crystals on white host, prized for color, luster, and sculptural form; notable localities include Kalahari, Broken Hill, Långban.
Inesite
Regional guide
Inesite from N’Chwaning Mines, South Africa
from the N’Chwaning Mines is one of the quietly sophisticated prizes of the Kalahari Manganese Field: not the loudest mineral from this legendary district, but one of the most distinctive when a specimen is right. The appeal is in the contrast between color and architecture. Good pieces show rich rose, salmon, Persian-red, or orange-red inesite in sprays, bow-ties, radiating tufts, and discrete bladed crystals, commonly set against pale calcite, orange prehnite, baryte, hydroxyapophyllite-(K), or dark manganese-oxide matrix. At their best, these specimens have the glassy, wet luster and crisp terminations collectors want in manganese silicates, but with the softer, fibrous elegance implied by the name inesite.