Articles

FANTASTIC BOOK ABOUT MINERALS AND MINING HISTORY FROM BRAZIL

Minerals & Precious Stones of Brazil

Authors – Carlos Cornejo and Andrea Bartorelli

 A new and excellent book about Brazilian minerals was just released. Brazil is widespread recognized as the main producer of mineral specimens in the world; there are tens of articles published on the international mineralogical magazines about the most important Brazilian localities, and thousands of excellent photos can be seen on Mindat and other mineral sites; but this book is not just a very good and extensive selection of photos, its main feature is that it is a very detailed description of the history of Brazilian mining, going back to  the time when Brazil was still a colony of Portugal. 

The minerals are divided into the chemical classes and sub-classes, but only the important ones that were found in Brazil are mentioned; but all of them were included, with at least one photo; among some rarities are photos of 2 crocoites (pg.326 and 331), mined on the late 1880’s. Inside each class the most important minerals receive special attention: on native elements the chapter gold (pg.138-173) starts with the history of the “gold rush” in Minas Gerais (where gold was found first in 1562, but the production reached the peak during the 1700’s, essentially alluvial mining, relying heavily in slave man-work), continuing through the 1800’s when the alluvial deposits got depleted and primary mining started (the most successful was the Morro Velho mine, opened in 1814, object of an entire chapter, pg.148-152) and continuing through modern times, with a detailed description of the “gold fever” on the Amazon forest, in special about the Serra Pelada mine, found in 1980 and run by more than a decade by over 10,000 men; the chapter about diamonds is also very detailed (pg.177-226). 

The class of silicates occupies near half of the book (pg.373-689) and inside it tourmaline is the longest chapter (100 pages), and I wrote most of it; all important Brazilian mines (Cruzeiro, Aricanga, Pederneira, Santa Rosa, Jonas, Itatiaia, Golconda, Barra do Salinas, Morro Redondo, Sapo, Paraíba) received a entire sub-chapter, as also did the greatest finds (the Jonas rubelite pocket of 1978, the find of the cuprian elbaites at Paraiba state in 1989 and, finally, the huge Morro Redondo production of 1994). 

The authors of the book are Carlos Cornejo (Chilean,  mineral collector, publisher and historian) and Andrea Bartorelli (Brazilian, geologist and mineral collector) and was sponsored by Vale, the largest Brazilian mining company; they invited me to join their enterprise in 2008, just after granting the sponsorship; they honored me with the offer to write the introduction chapter of the book; there are on the book 67 photos of minerals from my collection, which is not the most valuable but is one of the best Brazilian ones. 

There are 704 pages, with close to 1200 photos of minerals, mines and historical sites and documents; the quality of the photos and the printing are world class; most of them were taken by Marcelo Lerner, a Brazilian photographer, many by Jeff Scovil, and many by the collectors by themselves; as a proud father I cannot forget to mention my daughter Tatiana, that has 10 of her photos of rare micro Brazilian minerals reproduced. 

Many other important Brazilian collectors, mineralogists and mineral dealers helped the authors on this enterprise: Álvaro Lúcio, Júlio Landmann, Paulo Amorim, Reinhard Wegner, Odúlio Moura, Bruno and Rolando Gioia, Pércio Branco,  Luciano Gandini, Guido and Ragnhild Borgomanero, Jozo Nishimura, Diamond News, Wagner Colombaroli, Assad Marto, Carlos Barroso, Carlos, Paulo and Rubens Vasconcelos, Dilermando Melo (“Dilo”), Amsterdam Sauer, so many others, I apologize to all that were not mentioned here; it was a full team work, made only possible by the credibility, charisma  and competence of the authors; they travelled for one and half years all over Brazil, dived into hundreds of books, rescued and put together incredible historical photos.

I brought one book to the West Coast Mineral Show, in Pomona, CA, last month; everybody that saw the book wanted to buy it, but that was only a sample; I expect  that it will be widely accepted by the world’s mineral community; it is the first book, to my knowledge, that records, and will preserve forever, the fantastic and unique history of  the Brazilian mineral heritage. 

We will have the book available for sale; we are just finishing details about pricing and the agreement to allow us to receive the payments by credit card. We will also have the book on the next shows we are going to attend to: 

Sainte Marie aux Mines – June 23 to 27

East Coast Mineral Show – Springfield, MA – August __ to __

Denver – Holiday Inn Hoel, room 108 – September __ to __

Mineralientage München – Stand A_-____ – October __ to __

Luiz Menezes