1.7" Purple Cube-Dodecahedron Fluorite on Sparkling Quartz - China

Xia Yang Mine is a mine in central China's Fujian province that produces rich, dark flourite specimens, along with calcite and quartz specimens. The flourite that comes from the Xia Yang Mine tends to be blocky in shape with large faces, and can come in a range of colors from a vibrant blue to a deeper purple and a glassy green shade. The deep purple specimens are sometimes called "Tanzanite Fluorites" for the rich, strong blue-purple coloration and the way it shifts depending on the lighting.

Fluorite is a halide mineral comprised of calcium and fluorine, CaF2. The word fluorite is from the Latin fluo-, which means "to flow". In 1852 fluorite gave its name to the phenomenon known as fluorescence, or the property of fluorite to glow a different color depending upon the bandwidth of the ultraviolet light it is exposed to. Fluorite occurs commonly in cubic, octahedral, and dodecahedral crystals in many different colors. These colors range from colorless and completely transparent to yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, or black. Purples and greens tend to be the most common colors seen, with colorless, pink, and black being the rarest.