Background

- Sillimanite is a typical mineral of high grade Al-rich

metamorphic rocks
- normally found as white needles or fibrous aggregates
in gneiss or schists
- occasionally dyed red to simulate rubies
- As sillimanite is normally found embedded in gneiss
and schists, free-standing crystals are rare to non-
existent
- Sillimanite was first described as "fibrolite" by Count
de Bournon (1802) from southern India, where it was
found as fibrous aggregates accompanying corundum. The mineral was later described as sillimanite
from Chester, Connecticut by Bowen (1824).
https://www.mindat.org/a/best_sillimanite
- Named by George Thomas Bowen in 1824 in honor of Benjamin Silliman, Sr.
- The first specimens from Carnatic Coast (Karnaka), Tamil Nadu, India were described as fibrolite in
1802 by Jacques Louis Comte de Bournon.
-The same mineral from Chester, Middlesex County, Connecticut in the Appalachian Mountain Belt
was described as sillimanite in 1824 by George Thomas Bowen. It is named after the American
chemist Benjamin Silliman (1779-1864), the first to teach mineralogy at Yale University, who was the
father-in-law of the famed mineralogist, James Dwight Dana.
https://mineralexpert.org/article/sillimanite-aluminosilicate-mineral-overview

Background
- Skutterudite was discovered in Skuterud Mines,
Modum, Buskerud, Norway, in 1845.
- Named in 1845 by Wilhelm Karl von Haidinger after
after Skuterudåsen, a hill located in the locality of its
discovery, Skutterud, Modum, Norway.
- The earliest name that possibly refers to any
skutterudite-like material, cobaltum eineraceum, was
introduced by Georgius Agricola in 1529.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skutterudite
- skutterudite is a cobalt arsenide mineral containing
variable amounts of nickel and iron substituting for
cobalt with the ideal formula CoAs3
- It is a hydrothermal ore mineral found in moderate to
high temperature veins with other Ni-Co minerals.
- Smaltite is an alternative name for the mineral.
- It is mined as an ore of cobalt and nickel with a by-product of arsenic.
https://www.mindat.org/min-3682.html