7" Polished Agate Obelisk With Amethyst Pocket - Uruguay

While Brazil to the north is a much more prolific producer of amethyst, the amethyst mined near Artigas, Uruguay tends to be much darker with higher quality crystals. We import our material directly from the mines in Uruguay allowing us to offer it at better retail prices than anyone else. We carry a large variety of geodes, amethyst clusters, and collector quality crystal formations.



Amethyst is a purple variety of quartz (SiO2) and owes its violet color to natural irradiation, iron impurities, and the presence of trace elements, which result in complex crystal lattice substitutions. It’s considered a semi-precious gemstone, and just two centuries ago was considered to have a value on par with diamonds, sapphires and rubies. The largest, and best known amethyst deposit occur in southern Brazil and Uruguay but many localities around the world produce an amazing variety of amethyst crystals and formations.

Agate is a variety of microcrystalline quartz (chalcedony) that displays translucence and in some cases banding. Agate primarily forms when silica-rich fluids fill pockets within rock and/or fossils, resulting in deposition of the silica along the walls of the rock. This process can result in banding patterns as the composition and impurities of the fluids change over time. These banding patterns can either form as flat layers or rounded layers, depending on the surfaces available for deposition.