Elestial Quartz - Large Chunk (2-3 inch)

Elestial quartz (also known as skeletal quartz) exhibits unique internal and external dissolution-growth features resulting from unstable conditions during crystallization. These elestial growth features most often occur in the macrocrystalline quartz varieties rock crystal and smoky quartz, and more rarely in citrine or amethyst.  Elestial quartz crystals often form with a geometric pattern of lines, depressions and raised terminations (related to the quartz crystal structure) inscribed on their surface. Internally, these crystals exhibit plainly visible cavities in geometric patterns (also related to the quartz crystal structure) that can contain clay minerals of varied colors, sometimes accompanied by carbon dioxide or water. These cavities frequently have a layered or ribbed aspect and are sometimes so pronounced that they make the crystal appear almost hollow, giving rise to the term elestial quartz.

Occasionally these cavities contain both liquid and gas phases together known as two-phase inclusions. In rare cases, these two-phase inclusions in quartz can be visible to the naked eye and may show actual movement of the gas phase within the liquid phase (popularly known as elestial quartz crystal 'enhydros'). Elestial quartz occurs in vugs or pockets in granitic pegmatites associated with the feldspar varieties microline and albite, and it is sometimes found together with some of the more rare pegmatite minerals such as lepdiolite & amblygonite. Elestial quartz also occasionally occurs together with some of the rare pegmatite gem varietie such as aquamarine, kunzite, and toumaline.

Quartz Specifications:

• Color: Colorless
• Color of streak: White
• Moh’s hardness: 7
• Specific gravity: 2.65
• Cleavage: None
• Fracture: Conchoidal, Very Brittle
• Crystal system: Hexagonal (trigonal); Prisms, mostly compact
• Chemical composition: SiO2 Silicon Dioxide
• Transparency: Transparent
• Refractive index: 1.544-1.553
• Double refraction: + 0.009
• Dispersion: 0.013
• Pleochroism: None
• Absorption spectrum: Not usable
• Fluorescence: None