Natural Copper Ore Pendant in Sterling Silver (Trinity County California)

Wire Wrapped Copper Ore in Sterling Silver Wire.

Dimensions: 34mm x 23mm approx.
Thickness: 8mm approx.
Weight: 9+ grams or 48.00 Carats approx.

The mineral was first described for an occurrence in Cornwall, England in 1819 and named after the English chemist Smithson Tennant (1761-1815).

Tennantite from California
It is found in hydrothermal veins and contact metamorphic deposits in association with other Cu–Pb–Zn–Ag sulfides and sulfosalts, pyrite, calcite, dolomite, siderite, barite, fluorite and quartz.

The arsenic component of tennantite causes the metal smelted from the ore to be harder than that of pure copper, because it is a copper-arsenic alloy. In the later 20th century it was found that arsenical coppers had been more widely used in antiquity than had been previously realised, and it has been proposed that discoveries made by smelting ores like tennantite were significant steps in the progress towards the Bronze Age.