Shankou Mine, Shankou Town, Qingtian County, Lishui, Zhejiang, Chinai

Regional Level Types
Shankou Mine	Mine
Shankou Town	Town
Qingtian County	County
Lishui	Prefecture
Zhejiang	Province
China	Country

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Pyrophyllite deposit.

【Qingtian stone (elly jade) is a carving stone for carving art and seal, being a Literati's favorite, has therefore been called one of "China's four seal stones" and its sculpture art is an art of state.
Qingtian stone has different varieties of jelly-like stone. The traditional view has been that Qingtian stoneis a pyrophyllite mineral. Researches on Qiangtian stone has focused on carving art and culture, itsmineralogy do relatively litle studied. Also, because Qingtian Stone is mainly finely dispersed layered silicate minerals, modern testing technology must been used to identify its minerals.The author visited Qingtian stone ore deposits, local artists, and collected 10 jelly-like varieties ofQingtian stone. This paper intends to apply modern mineralogical methods such as polarized light microscopy,scanning electron microscopy, three-dimensional laser scanning confocal microscopy, combined with powderX-ray diffraction techniques, infrared spectroscopy, differential thermal analysis techniques, to makeunderstanding the mineral characteristics of Qingtian jelly stone. We obtained the result based on the 10species:
(1) Fengmenqing is a green varieties consisting mainly of sericite and pyrophyllite, is a sericite - pyrophyllite mixed Qingtian jelly jade. Compared with industrial pyrophyllite produced in Fangmen area,Fengmenqing has the same chemical composition but alkali-rich, aluminum-rich, silicon-poor, which is thereason because the Fengmenqing rarely contain quartz and contain small amounts of kaolinite.
(2)Dengguangdong is a pure pyrophyllite with small amount of quartz.(3)Huangjinyao is also a relatively pure species of pyrophyllite with small amount of quartz. It containsgoethite which result in banded yellowish brown color.
(4) Baixian (frozen-like) in Dengguangdong is caused by topaz crystals and hence higher hardness.
(5) Lanxing (blue star) is based by pyrophyllite and sericite, interspersed with spherical aggregatesdumorierite and andalusite aggregates, with small amount of kaolinite. Where the bright blue color caused bydumortierite.
(6) Lanhuading (blue flower nail) is mainly in the basal pyrophyllite, blue dotted with clumps of thegray-blue mass of microcrystalline corundum aggregates, there are a small amount of diaspora and kaolinite.
(7) Shaobaolu is a species of chromium-sericite, with minor quartz and andalusite. Its bright green is due to Cr-sericite.
(8) Longdanshi's (dragon egg stone) center part is a pure sericite, while Longdanxue (dragon blood) inthe out ring of Longdanshi is mainly sericite with pyrophyllite, containing a small amount of scatteredhematite, which made a blood color in edge.

Presences mineral impurities in Qingtian jelly jade make it poor-polishing, weaker waxy luster. However,the occurrence of various impurities minerals made Qingtian jelly jade many diversities with rich colors.Mining of Qingtian stone has a long history more than 1700 years, remaining many ancient mines. Weproposed that measures must been taken to protect the historical remaining sites in order to promote Qingtian jelly jade's culture and science.】
————[1]商亮节.青田石中若干冻石的矿物学特征研究[D].浙江大学,2013.

Mineral List

9 valid minerals.