So, by this time we have read about quartz that is clear, white, and pink, but did you know that there are still other colors and varieties of quartz out there? Indeed there are, and today we will focus upon a group of quartzes that have been dubbed brown quartz.
I assume that most people probably think that brown quartz is brown in color, and that is partly true: some of it is. Other colors that fall under the brown quartz category are grayish brown and black-colored. Quartz that is brown, light brown, or grayish brown is called smoky quartz, and black quartz is called morion. Brown quartz is also called cairngorm when it is found in the Cairngorm Mountains in Scotland. No one knows for sure exactly how brown quartz is formed, but scientists have observed colorless quartz crystals become brown when exposed to radiation. This has led many scientists to adopt the theory that brown quartz was given its color by exposure to natural radiation. I do not know of any properties of brown quartz that are too different from that of its colorless counterpart, save for its brown color. Brown quartz grows with the same crystal structure that colorless quartz follows, and very large crystals at that. In Brazil people have found crystals of brown quartz that weighed as much as 650 pounds!
Brown quartz is used mainly as a decorative stone. It is used to make carvings and cameos and occasionally it is used as jewelry. Morion is black, so I imagine that it has been used to make morning jewelry, but I have never heard whether or not this is true. Brown quartz, like any mineral, is also prized by collectors. One important thing to know is that a great deal of the brown quartz that is on the market today was produced artificially by exposing rock crystal quartz to radiation.
Like all quartz, brown quartz could be found anywhere on earthy, but it is usually found in certain locations. Some of the best locations in which brown quartz is found are Brazil, Madagascar, the Swiss Alps, and Colorado.
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