Natural Cleiophane Green Sphalerite with Galena and Quartz Cluster Crystal from Bulgaria 160g

A pale plate of white sugary quartz, crusted with fine micro-crystals and edged in warm tan host rock, carrying two kinds of crystal on its face. Bright silver galena is scattered across the quartz in sharp little octahedra, a dozen or more of them, clean-faced and highly lustrous. On the left a single larger cleiophane crystal stands out in dark olive-green with a glassy sheen, its faces stepped and well formed, with a smaller green crystal higher up. Faint rust-orange iron staining runs through the quartz between them.

Cleiophane is the name for low-iron sphalerite, the variety that comes out pale yellow, honey or green instead of the usual black. The green here is clearest at the crystal edges, where light passes through. Bulgaria's Rhodope lead-zinc deposits are a well-known source of it. Untreated. Sphalerite is 3.5 to 4 on the Mohs scale, galena 2.5 and quartz 7, so the sulfides set the handling limit, and the flat back makes this an easy piece to stand on a shelf.

Natural cleiophane green sphalerite with galena and quartz, Bulgaria, single piece.