Description
Iron IVA, Found in Namibia, 1836
Once a popular favorite among collectors, this essential iron meteorite has all but disappeared from the marketplace and superior examples such as this generate a great deal of interest. First recorded in 1836 in the Namib Desert in Western Namibia, the Gibeon iron was part of a massive and ancient fall. No crater has ever been found, but specimens have been recovered from a very large area. A long sojourn in the desert has resulted in surfaces taking on a rich and attractive natural patina that ranges from ocher, to red, to copper.
Gibeon is a medium octahedrite and it displays a complex and beautiful Widmanstätten pattern when cut and etched in the lab. Combine the appeal of its etch pattern with its exceptional stability and resistance to rusting and you have relentless demand from jewelers and watchmakers. Many Gibeons were cut up in order to fashion rings, wrist watch faces, and even guitar picks, but this piece is too fine to suffer such a fate. Cutting into slabs was a sad end for many other examples of this grand meteorite that journeyed across the solar system and then lay in the deserts of Namibia for thousands of years.
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