Andradite Garnets and Calcite on Matrix from Huanggang Mine, Inner Mongolia

Dimension: 10cm x 3.8cm x 2cm
Weight: 142g
Locality: Huanggang Mine, Keshiketeng Co, Chifeng Prefecture, Inner Mongolia, China
 
Aggregate of an attractive, well-crystallized specimen of Andradite Garnet which exhibits very well defined stepped growths and glassy faces from the famous Huanggang Mine in Mongolia.  The metallic, jet-black color is very alluring in person.  Associated with a piece of translucent Calcite crystal with rainbow color inclusion, this is a sophisticated and showy specimen.
 
Named in 1868 by a famous Brazilian Mineralogist James Dwight Dana in honor of José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva who first described and named what Dana (1868) defined as a sub-variety of Andradite.  The color of Andradite Garnet is in a range that extends from a dark golden green (like the topazolite from Stanley Butte, Arizona), through reddish brown to jet black.