Specimen of Switzerland

A friend of me has an old specimen in his collection which is too large for him after he changed his domicile. He wants to sell this specimen but he has no idea what would be a reasonable price. He asked me to help him accordingly.

I enclose a picture shows the specimen which is a smoky quartz found in the year 1908 in Switzerland, canton Uri at the Göschener Alp, Feldschier. The specimen is 60 x 40 cm and has a weight of 34 kgs.

What do you guess?

Uwe Ludwig

It's a fine Swiss smoky quartz. This enhances its value. It's a huge, fine, Swiss smoky quartz. This makes it harder to sell, and thus decreases it value. The picture doesn't give any detail about damage (or lack of damage) to the terminations. This is a critical issue when evaluating a specimen like this. In the absence of more and closer photos, it's very difficult to begin to make a valuation for this specimen.

Certainly at least several hundred dollars and without damage probably more than $1000. I think some of Mindaters from Europe might be able to give a better evaluation than I could. With out damage I could easily see it in an auction catalogue with an estimated price of several thousand dollars.

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Uwe, maybe you should sent a PM to Patrick Reith on Mineralienatlas. His username there is Mineralien Surselva: [www.mineralienatlas.de]
Patrick is a good guy, so he'll probably give you a good estimate on the price.

Because of the large size it looks more a decorator specimen than it is a collectors piece. So I think it would sell for more bucks at a decoration store than it would sell at a mineral show.