Moldavite from Chlum, Czech Republic: Mining and Gem Properties - Fachblog der Deutschen Gemmologischen Gesellschaft e.V.

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Details: 06 February 2024

One of the most well known and popular natural glasses is moldavite, which formed during a meteorite impact about 14.8 million years ago. Today, moldavite is mainly obtained from the Czech Republic. In spring 2022, the authors visited the largest mine currently in operation, a sand-and-gravel quarry near the small village of Chlum in the southern Czech Republic, where moldavite is found as a by-product. This article reviews the formation and distribution of moldavite, gives an overview of current mining activities and reports the gemmological characteristics of samples collected by the authors.

This article was first published in The Journal of Gemmology, 38(7), 2023, pp. 696-707. A pdf-file of this article is available here.

Authors

Dr. Tom Stephan, DGemG,
Štěpán Jaroměřský, Faculty of Science, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic
Lukáš Zahradníček, National Museum, Prague, Czech Republic &
Stefan Müller, DSEF