Cerussite (heart twin) on Cerussite

This is one of the legendary 1960s cerussite gem twins from the Kombat Mine in Namibia! For those who know what these are, and how infinitely rare a chance this is to acquire one, you already know what you are looking at. Perhaps a few dozen survive, at best, in major collections and mostly in museums. This is a superb small cabinet piece. It has total transparency and total clarity, the best luster and gemminess. Moreover, this features a "heart" twinned cerussite sitting on a matrix of a single, upright, untwinned crystal! The twin is 5.4 cm tall tip to tip and is pristine, except only a tiny barely 1 mm ding if you agonize to look closely. That is about as good as you can ask for a soft mineral 60 years or so out of the ground. The single crystal to the side shows interesting texture and chevron patterning as it rises. It is complete all around, and also gemmy and transparent. We need to point out that although this the "pedestal crystal" is pristine and complete on display faces it does, admittedly, have a slight ding on tip of the slender termination - one which is no surprise and in any case could be rectified at a modern mineral lab with very minor restoration. This is trivial and we are disclosing it for the sake of completeness, although we have chosen not to perform a restoration on an otherwise perfect piece. Perhaps each major major collector of the old era had one of these... and now they are gone, going into the next generation of collections as they turn up. We have not had a specimen this good, from this find, in nearly a decade despite handling perhaps 6000 pieces a year and many major collections. NOTE: this specimen must be purchased with arrangement for hand delivery. Cerussite is temperature sensitive and this has already survived since the 1960s, so we will not risk it in uncontrolled shipment. Dr. Erika Pohl-Ströher - SCH249

Unknown Owner

Product details

Species

Cerussite

SizeSmall Cabinet

Dimensions5.7 x 3.5 x 2.8 cm

Locality

Namibia, Otjozondjupa Region, Kombat Mine

Added on12/02/2024

Comments

Known provenance

2024/12