Muséum national d'histoire naturelle _ The species

FROM : Mine de Peyrebrune, Réalmont, Tarn, France
SIZE : 2.5 cm

This well-crystallized fluorite is on a matrix of gray lamelar siderite and of small crystals of white transparent calcite.

The fluorite is a beautiful cube of 1.5 cm edge. Brown colour predominate but one observes from crystal middle to crystal outskirt a decrease of the colour intensity. Edges are almost white.

This sample comes from Peyrebrune mines in Tarn area, France. Its veins have been worked since Antiquity. This sample is currently exposed in the Treasure Room, within the Gallery of Mineralogy of the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle.

Photography: Louis-Dominique Bayle, © MNHN.

SPECIE : Fluorite

HISTORY : Name derived from Latin "fluere" meaning flowing, in reference to its melting behavior

Species first described in 1529 by Agricola Georgius (1494-1555), German mineralogist

Type-locality: undefined because species already known by the Ancients
ANCIENT NAME : Spatum vitreum, calx fluorata, spath fluor

CHEMICAL FORMULA : Ca F2
CRYSTAL SYSTEM : Cubic
COLOR : Colourless, white, blue, green, yellow, violett, pink
DIAPHANIETY : Transparent to translucent
LUSTER : Vitreous
STREAK : White
MORPHOLOGY : Well-formed crystals, cubic-shaped, octahedrally-shaped
HARDNESS : 4
DENSITY : 3,18

CHEMICAL CLASS : III - Halogénures
GROUP : Fluorite
STRUNZ CLASS BEFORE 2001 : 3/A.08-10
STRUNZ CLASS AFTER 2001 : 3.AB.25

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Fluorite

MNHN N°196.133

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