Marcasite jewelry was particularly popular in the eighteenth century, the Victorian era and with Art Nouveau jewellery designers. Marcasite jewelry is made from pyrite, the white form of ‘fools gold’. Real marcasite lis much lighter, brittle and its instabilty makes it unsuitable for creating jewelry. Originally the name marcasite was given by mineralogists to an unstable form of iron sulphide crystallizing in the rhomibic system, but the marcasite found in jewelry today is crystallized in the cubic system
Marcasite jewelry has been made since the time of the Ancient Greeks The jewelry is usually made by setting small pieces of pyrite into silver. A less expensive type is made by glueing pieces of pyrite rather than setting. A similar-looking type of jewellery can be made from small pieces of cut steel. Jewelers usually describe marcasite as a bronze color, its designs usually resembling an “Art Deco” period. You’ll generally see marcasite jewelry shining with a vintage estate look.
Marcasite jewelry appears in a huge variety: necklaces, bracelets, rings, ear rings, pendants, brooches, pins, tiaras, on decorative buttons. Design and sizes vary a great deal as well, from Victorian flourishes to the popular Art Deco shapes. It suits the “Goth” look and can be be quite timeless in classic designs, making a statement with all types of fashion wear.
More information about Pyrites here
and real marcasite here:
- Color is brassy yellow with a greenish tint at times. A multi-colored tarnish may exist that is the result of oxidation.
- Luster is metallic.
- Transparency: Crystals are opaque.
- Crystal System is orthorhombic; 2/m 2/m 2/m
- Crystal Habits include the tabular, bladed or prismatic forms. A twinning effect produces spear shaped crystal and repeated twinning produces a “cock’s comb” cluster. Also massive, botryoidal, stalactitic and nodular. Sometimes as a replacement mineral of fossils and a pseudomorph of pyrite.
- Cleavage is poor in two directions.
- Fracture is uneven.
- Hardness is 6 – 6.5
- Specific Gravity is approximately 4.8+ (average for metallic minerals)
- Streak is greenish to brownish black.
- Other Characteristics: A sulfur smell is sometimes detectable.
- Associated Minerals are calcite, dolomite, quartz, goethite, fluorite, pyrrhotite, bornite, chalcocite, sphalerite, pyrite, galena and other sulfides.
- Notable Occurrences are widespread, but the more notable sites include Joplin, Missouri; Grant County, Wisconsin and Hardin County, Illinios, USA; Guanajuato, Mexico; Escale Pas de Calais, France; Peru; China and Russia.
- Best Field Indicators are crystal habit, smell and greenish tint.
The mineral marcasite, sometimes called white iron pyrite, is iron sulfide (FeS2). Marcasite is often mistakenly confused with pyrite, but marcasite is lighter and more brittle. Specimens of marcasite often crumble and break up due to the unstable crystal structure, and it is this crystal structure that is the main difference between marcasite and pyrite. Though marcasite has the same chemical formula as pyrite, it crystallizes in a different crystal system, thereby making it a separate mineral..
On fresh surfaces it is pale yellow to almost white and has a bright metallic luster. It tarnishes to a yellowish or brownish color and gives a black streak. It is a brittle material that cannot be scratched with a knife. The thin, flat, tabular crystals, when joined in groups, are called “cockscombs.” The name was given in 1845 from an Arabic or Moorish name meaning pyrite or similar minerals with a metallic bronze color.
