Copper pseudomorphs after Cuprite with Silver

Copper pseudomorphs after Cuprite with Silver

sold
Locality
Rubtsovsky Mine, Altai Krai, Siberia, Russia
Minerals
Copper, Cuprite, Silver
Dimensions
2.0 x 1.6 x 1.3 cm
Size class
Thumbnail
SID
COPPER5

The cuprites from the Rubtsovsky Mine in Russia are widely considered the best ever found. The Rubtsovsky Mine is an operating copper mine, and the oxidation zone has produced Cuprites, Azurites, native copper, silver, and iodine minerals like Miersite, and Marshite. I have been following the production for the last two years, to better understand how these are unique and what pieces stand out from "the crowd." About 95+% of the production have damage of some kind to a corner or edge. This is largely due to the miners who when extracting crystals from the kaolin clay zone (which protects the Cuprites), they drop them into their pockets, and they get dinged. 

This piece involves two distinct crystals of partially pseudomorphed native copper after cuprite crystals. The edges are sharp, the lustre is very good, and sprinkled on two faces is the distinctive native silver (which only occurs at this mine world wide  (Mineralogical Almanac Vol. 16, issue 1, 2011)). No damage.