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GeneralHow rare is Cianciulliite ?

2nd Jun 2007 19:33 UTCThomas Krassmann (2)

Hello from Germany

A friend of mine told me, that he just happened to came across a small cianciulliite specimen from Sterling Hill.

Being a long time systematic mineral collector (30 years+) he asked me, how rare this mineral is. So I did a bit of research and found, that the original description back in 1991 was done on a single Micromount and that there was and still is apparently very little cianciulliite available.

So I am a bit confused. Is it possible, that my friend here in Germany really bought a cianciulliite ? The specimen in question shows dark red to dark brown platy crystals or at least crystalline scales on a layered matrix, dotted with franklinite crystals, so at least the specimen seems to be from Sterling Hill or Franklin.

Can anyone help please ?

Thank you

Thomas

2nd Jun 2007 21:58 UTCMark Heintzelman 🌟 Expert

John Cianciulli passed away a few years ago, My personal collection of F/SH also owes greatly to his assistance and contributions (a prince among paupers).

Your right to be suspicious. To my knowledge there had been no additional Find of Cianciullite at Franklin (not recovered at Sterling Hill), but hopefully Chester Lemanski could chime in to confirm/contradict this. His knowledge is more complete and up-to-date than my own, and would likely be the final word on the subect here at mindat,

To the best of my current knowledge, the Franklin Mineral Museum holds the only confirmed specimen (the type specimen) of Cianciulliite.

MRH

2nd Jun 2007 22:16 UTCThomas Krassmann (2)

Hello again and good evening

One more bit of information :

On the accompanying lable for the ? Cianciulliite ? is written :

Cianciulliite new !

Sterling Hill

1993

Bruce E. Smith

Wholesale Minerals

and a accompanying telephone number

Maybe this helps a bit in my question

Greetings from Germany

Thomas

2nd Jun 2007 22:58 UTCMark Heintzelman 🌟 Expert

The latest writing/refference on the species I'm aware of is later than that date (1995). I would wait for Chet to respond, he'd know more than I.

MRH

4th Jun 2007 12:35 UTCChester S. Lemanski, Jr.

Chet here!

It is a fake! There have been many such fake Cianciulliite specimens showing up. They are invariably apparent Hendricksite mica flakes in capsules - very common. These fakes aren't even close to the real thing. The fakes seemingly pass through the hands of 2 dealers that I know of, and may have a common source. This IS a FAKE!!

Real Cianciulliite remains essentially a one specimen species (confirmed type specimen) and possibly one or a few untested possibles in institutional holdings as I recall.

4th Jun 2007 14:13 UTCAlan Plante

Hi Chet

I thought I had heard the "It's a fake!" story about this a couple years ago; but I couldn't remember the source. Maybe you?

I had received what was basically a gel-cap of flakes several years earlier from a nebulous source. Unconfirmed - looked like junk-mica scraps to me, even under the scope.

Thank you for the confirmation.

How about posting a note in the "Fakes & Frauds" Forum to alert/warn others?

KOR!

Alan Plante

4th Jun 2007 15:02 UTCUwe Kolitsch Manager

Have added comment to the cianciulliite page.

4th Jun 2007 15:06 UTCMark Heintzelman 🌟 Expert

Thanks Chet and Alan. I took the oportunity to contact Herb Yates at simplethinking.com, He too confirms that to his knowledge, none has ever been found at Sterling Hill.

His suggestion was to contact this dealer directly to see what supporting publication (evidence) he can offer to support this claim.

From my own personal perspective, I do find the idea of pulling off such a fake to be rather gutsy (not meant to be complimentary), This is a good example why reference is so critical, and why the burden of proof should lay with the claimant. It is far more difficult to prove something DIDN'T happen, than it is to prove that it did.

MRH

4th Jun 2007 16:04 UTCAlan Plante

Thank you, Uwe

And "Amen to that!" Mark.

Regards

Alan

4th Jun 2007 16:12 UTCChester S. Lemanski, Jr.

Cianciulliite was obviously never found at Sterling Hill, nor were there ever any proposals that it had been,or might have been, found there. The assemblage is very restrictive and not found at SH.

I strongly predict that contacting the particular so-called "dealer" involved will be a complete waste of time.

4th Jun 2007 16:35 UTCMark Heintzelman 🌟 Expert

Hey Chet,

I think we all expect the same lack of results as you, but nothing wrong with putting this dealers "feet to the fire" as it were. Whether he responds or not, it would still serve as further confirmation to the lack of refference on this.

You (and I) may not feel the dealer is due any courtesy regarding this issue, but I still feel it ought to be adressed (standard procedure).

MRH

4th Jun 2007 17:55 UTCRichard C. Bostwick

To this discussion I can only add that bogus specimens of rare Franklin and Sterling Hill minerals have been widely available in the past few decades.

Few collectors, even in the Franklin-Sterling Hill collector community, know what some of the very rare F/SH minerals look like, or how trustworthy their sources are, and the drive to obtain a rare species usually trumps common sense. We have had more than one dealer and/or collector whose specialty was spotting odd-looking Franklin-Sterling minerals that bore a superficial resemblance to much rarer minerals, then marketing them as the rarer (i.e. more expensive) ones.

One example is schallerite, a Franklin-only species, which under the right circumstances can easily be confused with veins of granular friedelite or manganpyrosmalite, particularly if you have never seen an authentic schallerite and have difficulty distinguishing Franklin specimens from Sterling Hill specimens. There must be ten or twenty bogus schallerites in collections for every genuine example, and the motives for identifying friedelite or manganpyrosmalite as schallerite range from ignorance to wishful thinking to fudging ("Gee, this sort of matches Palache's description.") to downright desire to defraud.

Those wishing to buy rare Franklin-Sterling Hill species should get themselves to an institution or private collection with authenticated examples, so they can at least see what some of these desirable rarities are SUPPOSED to look like. And, of course, there are reputable mineral analysts who can give you an answer, though usually at a price.

Dick Bostwick

5th Jun 2007 05:27 UTCAlan Plante

Hi Dick

I think you sum it all up very well. To boil it down even further, how about:

"Buyer Beware!"

:~}

Regards

Al Plante

7th Jun 2007 23:08 UTCThomas Krassmann (2)

Hello from Germany

thank you very much for all of your responses. In the meantime we have made two photos, which you can find here

http://giantcrystals.strahlen.org/privat/cianc1.jpg

and (more detail) here

http://giantcrystals.strahlen.org/privat/cianc2.jpg

The specimen in question looks quite solid, not just loose mica chunks and measures about 4 x 4 cm.

Maybe somebody can comment further on it

Thank you again and Glueck Auf

Thomas

8th Jun 2007 00:07 UTCChester S. Lemanski, Jr.

Th.,

Thanks for the photos. This is nothing more than common willemite-franklinite ore from the Sterling ore body (Sterling Hill). The piece appears to have either serpentine or friedelite veinlets on it or in it. It is an outright fake - there is NO Cianciulliite from Sterling Hill - none whatever. Most of the fake Cianciulliite's sold are flakes of brown Hendricksite mica in pill capsules, this one is different.

Chet

8th Jun 2007 02:14 UTCJason B. Smith Expert

Hello all. I do not mean to hijack Mr. Krassmans thread but I also have a quick question about a F/SH specimen. I recently got an old Kraissl mount of flinkite with cahnite that was purchased from Wards sometime ago. I am not in doubt of the identification of the specimen due to the credible lineage but I do have a question about where it originated. The only thing mentioned on the label is that it came from the Buckwheat. Chet can you help me track down where the specimen may have originated. I am not incredibly versed in the ins and outs of Franklin/Sterling Hill. Thanks, Jason.

8th Jun 2007 20:45 UTCJim Ferraiolo

Pete Dunn's Franklin books has these entries:

"Flinkite occurs associated with jarosewichite, cahnite, hausmannite, and romeite, in vugs in a green andradite/franklinite matrix. Additional descriptive information was provided by King (1993). Flinkite has not been reported from Sterling Hill."

Van King - Picking Table <34(1), 10-13 (1993)>

also:

"Cahnite was reported by Cook (1973) from the Buckwheat Dump, associated with andradite, flinkite, and â€œcarminiteâ€? (later found to be jarosewichite)"

Cook - "Recent work on the minerals of Franklin and Sterling Hill", MR 4,62-66(1973)

The jarosewichite paper also discusses the assemblage.

Chet probably has more.

10th Jun 2007 10:56 UTCThomas Krassmann (2)

Hello from Germany again (back from Mexiko)

Thank you for your answers

Did I got that right ? The identity of Cianciulliite from Sterling Hill is quetsionable as such ?

So this mineral might be not a valid species at all ?

Glück Auf and Regards from Germany

Thomas

10th Jun 2007 14:21 UTCMike Rumsey Manager

Hey guys,

Just for the record a further bone fide cianciullite specimen exists at the NHM in london. Even though not referenced in the original paper, this specimen isolated from the original - was used for the reflectance measurements that are published in the 1991 paper, it has been verified as cotype by two of the original authors C.J.Stanley & A.J.Criddle. It is registered in the NHM collections as BM 1990,379.

If its just this specimen and the main type specimen at the franklin mineral museum, its a very rare minreal species indeed.

Cheers,

Mike

10th Jun 2007 14:36 UTCChester S. Lemanski, Jr.

The London specimen is a piece of the one and only type specimen. Again,there may be one or more additional Cianciulliite specimens in existence but as far as I know, none is confirmed. As I recall, one of the problems with the analysis of the type specimen was that the material proved to be fungible and tended to decrepitate under energy bombardment.

Th.,

You have it almost correct. The answer is a definate NO!!! It is not in question - it simply is not Cianciulliite. It is FAKE.

Jason,

There is little that I can add to what Jim already stated except (trivia) - there was only one chunk of this stuff found by the Kraissl's, and no more since. All of the legitimate Flinkite and Jarosevichite from Franklin came from that single chunk of rock. The Kraissl's broke it up and mounted many of the pieces. The Kraissl collection was sold after their passing and was brokered through Dick Hauck. The Ward's Natural Science Establishment bought the micromounts and Vandall King verified each prior to sale by Ward's. You should have a legitimate specimen.

27th Jan 2021 22:07 UTCVandall Thomas King Manager

The curater of the Franklin Mineral Museum, Lee Lowell, was given a single tiny grain of cianciulliite by Pete Dunn. I do not think that John Cianciullii was given a grain, because of his untimely death. Lee's miniscule grain is illustrated at Mindat.

30th Jan 2021 01:09 UTCSteven Kuitems Expert

The main matrix specimen for Cianciulliite is at the Smithsonian NMNH. It is about 3”, I had the privilege to examine it under the microscope many years ago when visiting Dr. Dunn. John Cianciullii only had an SEM photo of his name sake mineral.

So Thomas, it is Uber rare !!

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