Mineral name pronunciation

Mineral Matters #580

…and more Hidden Collection!

There are a few mineral names that I often hear pronounced differently, mainly depending on where you live. But I recently came across one that I hadn’t heard before. Chrysocolla.

This is a mineral that is usually pronounced one of two ways:

• Chris-oh-cola

• Cries-oh-cola

But the new one for me, by someone that I have a high regard for as a mineralogist, was “Cry--sockola”.

I personally will stick with “Chris-oh-cola”.

Anyway, the specimen below is a chris-oh-cola after azurite from the (not so famous) Red Cloud Mine (actually from the Red Cloud Copper Mine according to the label). Upon close inspection, I found two additional species, likely bastnäsite-(Ce), and agardite-(La). See closeup photos below.

The Red Cloud Copper Mine and the adjacent Red Cloud Fluorite Mine are joint Type Localities for agardite-(La).

However, according to Mindat, bastnäsite-(Ce) is only recorded from the Red Cloud Fluorite Mine, and chrysocolla is only recorded from the Red Cloud Copper Mine. Of course, that doesn’t mean that either species can’t occur at both localities.

Below: Chrysocolla after azurite, bastnäsite-(Ce), and agardite-(La), Red Cloud copper mine, Gallinas Mountains, Red Cloud District, Lincoln County, New Mexico, USA. Width of view 6mm.

Below: Closeup of colourless hexagonal plates of likely bastnäsite-(Ce).

Below: Closeup of acicular groups of agardite-(La).