Cylindrite

specimen number:
2354189

location:
Santa Cruz Mine, Poopo, Oruro, Bolivia

description:
Classic for this locality and species, very rich cylinder shaped crystals of lustrous metallic cylindrite to 1.5 cm in length embedded throughout the front of matrix. In good condition.

Located in the historic Poopo mining district of Oruro, Bolivia, the Santa Cruz Mine is a hydrothermal vein deposit hosted within folded sedimentary and igneous rocks renowned for complex sulfosalt mineralization. Mining operations in the area have targeted base and precious metals like tin, silver, and lead since the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The mine is especially famous among mineral collectors and researchers as a premier locality for cylindrite, a rare sulfosalt mineral recognized by its distinctive, microscopic tube-like or cylindrical rolling crystal habits formed in low-temperature hydrothermal veins. While commercial extraction has fluctuated over the decades, the locality remains legendary for producing world-class specimen material of these unusual metallic minerals.

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