Home > Mexico IV Ojuela II – January 19 > MS1752 Smithsonite

Smithsonite - Sold


Smithsonite is zinc carbonate and a member of the calcite group. François Sulpice Beudant (1787-1850) dubbed this mineral smithsonite in his seminal 1832 Traité Élémentaire de Minéralogie. The mineral name honors James Smithson (1765?-1829), an Englishman who never visited the United States, but nevertheless founded the Smithsonian Institution with a gift of his mineral collection and cash.

Smithsonite here forms a 2.5 cm wide radiating globule on contrasting dark limonite matrix. Smithsonite is not typically so well developed at Ojuela.