Brookite with Quartz

specimen number:
1052605

location:
Riedertobel, Ried, Reuss Valley, Uri, Switzerland

description:

Thin bladed crystals of brookite to 0.7 cm in size nestled amongst crystallized quartz. Some damage present as seen. The prominent crystal is in good condition. Nice for this classic locality, the specimen comes with an antique label as shown at the end of the video. The label gives an original acquisition date in 1908.

Riedertobel, located near Sedrun in the Canton of Graubunden, Switzerland, is a world-famous Alpine-cleft locality situated within the Aar Massif. Geologically, the site consists of Variscan granites and gneisses that underwent intense tectonic fracturing during the Alpine orogeny, creating open cavities where hydrothermal fluids deposited exceptional crystals. The locality is most prized for its brookite, an orthorhombic titanium dioxide polymorph, which occurs as lustrous, transparent to translucent, reddish-brown "tabulated" crystals often found on a matrix of smoky quartz or adularia. Historically, mining and quarrying in the traditional sense were not the primary focus; instead, the area has been worked by "strahlers" (traditional Swiss crystal hunters) for centuries. Systematic recovery of fine mineral specimens became particularly well-documented in the late 19th and throughout the 20th centuries as interest in Alpine mineralogy grew. While there is no industrial start or end date for the site, it remains an active and strictly regulated area for specimen recovery, continuing to produce some of the finest examples of the species known to science through 2026.

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