RHODOCHROSITE

CORRESPONDENCES . HISTORY . COMPOSITION . HARDNESS . HEALTH BENEFITS . COLLECTIBLE CARD . SHOP

CORRESPONDENCES

EARLY FALL
Energy

LIBRA
Northern Hemisphere

ARIES
Southern Hemisphere

A / DO
Music Note

Rose Pink
Color

BASE
Chakra

The name Rhodochrosite comes from the Greek rhodos, meaning “rose,” and khros, meaning “color,” and refers to its vivid pink to rose-red color. It has a vitreous and pearly luster, often banded in layers ranging from white or light pink, to those that are nearly red and opaque.

HISTORY

Rhodochrosite was first described in 1813 in Sacaramb, Romania, in reference to a sample from Cavnic, Maramureş, present-day Romania. The material became popular in the 1970s, after it was discovered in the mine of Capillitas, in Catamarca, Argentina.

During the 1960s Chile was the provider of copper to Argentina, but after a limit conflict between these two countries, and Chile’s threat to stop their provision of copper, the Argentine government opened copper mines in Catamarca. The copper was too expensive to extract, but Chile retracted its threat and continued to provide copper to Argentina, rendering the mines obsolete.

A German tourist traveling in the state of Catamarca, came across the Capillitas copper mine and took some specimens of a pink stone with him. Around 1965, María del Carmen Rodriguez Sobrón received a call from California asking about this material, its extraction and commercialization. Her daughter, Isabel Sobrón, investigated the market and together with her later-to-be-husband, under the Juan L. Tito & Co, they extracted, cut, polished, crafted, marketed and exported this new material worldwide, mostly to Germany, United States and Japan. Today, this beautiful pink stone, known as Rhodochrosite, has become Argentina’s national stone.

Rhodochrosite was later found in Colorado and was officially named its state mineral in 2002.

COMPOSITION

Rhodochrosite is a manganese carbonate mineral with chemical composition MnCO3. In its (rare) pure form, it is typically a rose-red color, but impure specimens can be shades of pink to pale brown. It streaks white, it crystallizes in the trigonal system, and cleaves with rhombohedral carbonate cleavage in three directions.

HARDNESS

Mohs Scale Hardness: 3.5 - 4

The Mohs scale of mineral hardness is a qualitative ordinal scale characterizing scratch resistance of various minerals through the ability of harder material to scratch softer material.