STIBARSEN
Specimen sts-2
$ 27.00Dims: 1.22x0.92x0.74" (3.10x2.33x1.88cm)
Wt: 0.75oz (21.3g)
No.7 Mine, Trebsko near Príbram, Czech Republic
This is a rather complex and unusual specimen. The most prominent surfaces are of silvery-black stibarsen, yet most of the surfaces are concave - we are seeing the inside of the botryoidal cluster, the original centers are not present. A loupe reveals that the stibarsen is silver, but with a coating of tiny balls of a lustrous black mineral which may be more stibarsen (or a weathering product). There is a significant vein of a pale yellow mineral which may be apatite or beryl or something else, but there are no clean, undistorted crystals to aid identification. There are also some crystals of a brownish-red transparent mineral, possibly a garnet. Thre are a few, smaller areas of true botryoidal stibarsen, still with that coating of tiny black crystal balls.