What is Moldavite?
Moldavite is a piece of an impact plume frozen into glass. Natural grooves and bubbles make every specimen look like a small landscape, while a documented Czech locality turns that surface into a precise geological story.
Mineralogy and crystal structure
Reference formula: SiO2. Moldavite is a natural impact glass, not a crystalline mineral with a periodic lattice. Its bubbles, flow textures and etched sculptural surfaces preserve a high-energy impact event; the green colour and provenance are more diagnostic than a mineral formula. Moldavite is classified with a material or rock rather than one mineral class and has a not applicable because the entry has no single crystal lattice crystal system. Typical hardness is 5.5–6.5 on the Mohs scale and specific gravity is approximately 2.3–2.4.
Colour, lustre and habit
Typical colours include olive-green, forest-green, brown-green. The usual glassy, irregular, sculpted habit and vitreous, dull lustre help describe a specimen, but colour alone is not diagnostic.
Formation and notable localities
Moldavite forms in or is associated with impact-melt ejection and rapid cooling during meteorite impacts. Important documented localities include the Czech Republic, especially Bohemia and Moravia, with tektites known from several impact fields worldwide.
A green impact glass from deep time
Moldavite is a piece of an impact plume frozen into glass. Natural grooves and bubbles make every specimen look like a small landscape, while a documented Czech locality turns that surface into a precise geological story.
Collecting and care
Glass-like edges can be sharp; protect from impact and retain locality documentation. No artificial crystal lattice is assigned.
