Bournonite

specimen number:
2062692

location:
Herodsfoot Mine, Lanreath, Cornwall, England, UK

description:
Classic twinned lustrous metallic crystals of bournonite measuring to 0.5 cm in size across the front of matrix. This is in excellent condition. Very choice historical thumbnail specimen, this comes with a previous label from the A.E. Seaman Mineral Museum in the donor of the piece was noted L.L. Hubbard.

Herodsfoot Mine, located near Lanreath in Cornwall, England, operated primarily as a silver-lead mine during the nineteenth century and achieved world-class status among mineral collectors for its extraordinary sulphosalt specimens. While the mine's commercial focus was extracting lead ore and silver from deep underground lodes, its underground cavities or vughs yielded world-renowned specimens of the mineral bournonite between the 1850s and 1870s. Bournonite from this locality became famous for its dark steel-grey metallic luster and distinctive, complexly twinned crystal habit that earned it the nickname cogwheel ore. Local mineral dealer Richard Talling acquired the finest of these cogwheel specimens directly from miners and distributed them to major museums and elite collectors worldwide, cementing Herodsfoot as the definitive historic type locality for the species before the mine closed permanently in 1884.

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