Tanzanite - Specimen

Mined from: Merelani Hills, Simanjiro District, Manyara Region, Tanzania

Description: Tanzanite has only been known since 1967. The most common telling is that a Maasai herder found violet-blue crystals weathering out of the ground in the Merelani Hills of northern Tanzania. He showed them to prospector Manuel d'Souza, who quickly registered mining claims, hoping he had found sapphire. Other accounts credit a Meru herdsman, Jumanne Mhero Ngoma, with the first find.

At first no one was sure what the crystals were. They turned out to be a blue gem variety of zoisite. Tiffany & Co. became the main distributor, named the gem after the country it came from, and launched it with a big publicity campaign in 1968.

All tanzanite comes from this one small area, where it is mined from folded metamorphic rocks. Hot fluids moving through faults reacted with the rock and grew the crystals, often in cavities or along quartz veins. The colour is linked to vanadium, and tanzanite shows strong pleochroism, looking blue, violet or other shades from different directions.

This one of a kind tanzanite specimen is a compact natural crystal with a rich blue-violet body color and a stout, elongated prismatic form. The crystal shows the straight-sided shape and lengthwise striations typical of tanzanite, along with natural surface interruptions, internal fractures, and a slightly uneven termination that confirm it has not been polished or cut. Its color shifts between violet, indigo, and deep blue depending on lighting and angle, which gives the specimen a lot of visual life for such a small piece.

Tanzanite is often associated with insight, calm, and thoughtful change. Many people are drawn to it for its quiet, reflective energy and see it as a stone connected with intuition, clarity, and meaningful transition.

Quantity: 1pc
With this product, you will get the actual stone in the photograph.