Mendeleev’s crystals, meteorites and the Ural gems: St Petersburg University opens the Mineralogical Museum virtual tour
St Petersburg University launches an online excursion in the oldest mineralogical museum in Russia, where the first exhibits date back to 1785. Visitors will be able to see: rocks of the meteor ‘Borodino’, which fell near Borodino village right before the famous battle; a collection of minerals of Dmitri Mendeleev; and samples of the stones which were found by renowned scientists and educators during geological expeditions.
The tour around the Mineralogical Museum of St Petersburg University, with over 30,000 exhibits on display, opens with a panorama of memorial exhibitions. One of the first is the collection of minerals of the great chemist Dmitri Mendeleev. It comprises 245 samples that represent 133 types of minerals. Part of them are connected with the scientist’s attempts to prove the principles of the Periodic Law, when Mendeleev studied perovskite, rutile, cerite and other minerals.
Near the collection of Mendeleev there is a collection of the mineralogist Mikhail Erofeev, which is also a great pride of the Museum. Through the efforts of the scientist, a crystallographic school started to take shape in St Petersburg; later it resulted in opening a department of crystallography at Leningrad State University. Here are presented: dopings of crystals of potash feldspar; common feldspar; crystals of heliodor and la lapis lazuli; inserts of amethyst and quartz; and crystals of beryl, which earned the nickname ‘King Lear’ and ‘King Lear’s fool’ because of its unusual shape.
Among the objects of the virtual tour there are minerals that were collected be the geologist, geographer and mineralogist Ernst Hoffmann during his expedition in the South Ural (1828-1829). In 1851, the scientist presented this collection to St Petersburg University. Today, visitors to the Museum can see: a prismatic crystal of crocoite of a transparent beige-rose topaz; crystals of amethyst-like quartz; and spherolitic congeries of green malachite.
In the same hall visitors have a chance to see the collection of the Professor of the Mineralogy Department of St Petersburg University Aleksei Brusnitsyn, who made a major contribution into studies of one of the traditional Ural gems - rhodonite.
The mineral was first found in 1795 and immediately it was actively mined. The royal house Faberge started using it in jewellery.
The collection comprises various samples of this stone: rhodonite with dendrites and veins of oxyls of manganese, with tephroite and vernadite and others. Also, there are minerals of the quartz group from deposits located all over the world: Romania, Brazil, Norway, Armenia and Australia.
Another priceless 19th century collection of the Mineralogical Museum is a collection of minerals of Archbishop Nilus, who was famous for his educational activities. He studied geology of the shores of Lake Baikal, the Oka River, the Angara River and other bodies of water, and built an immense collection of minerals which included crystals of emeralds, aquamarines and blue topaz.
At the virtual exhibition visitors will see great samples of chariot – ornamental jewellery stone that was one of the greatest mineralogical discoveries of the 20th century. In the collection that was built by Mikhail Evdokimov there are stones with various texture: fine crenulated; crenulated augen with radiated aggregate of laminal stones; and compact homogeneous constitution.
Also, in the Museum there is a collection of gems of Vadim Vinci. There are fragments of geode of various forms, samples of crimson red garnet, pop-outs of transparent and dark-purple fluor spar, cuttings of amethyst, and chrysoprase settings mostly from Russian deposits.
In the next hall visitors can study systematic mineralogical collection, which is the core value of the Museum collection.
There are showcases along the walls of the hall and in its centre with cyclosilicates, sulphides and their analogues, halogenides, chromates, molybdates, tungstates and many other minerals.
The virtual tour gives visitors the opportunity to take a closer look at rare samples as well as find out how native copper, silver and gold look like.
In the third and last hall there are objects of cosmic origin – iron and stone-iron meteorites. On display there are truly unique exhibits of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century. For example, rocks of the meteorite ‘Borodino’ which fell near the Borodino village on 5 September 1812 – right before the famous battle.
The virtual tour provides short text descriptions and colourful images of minerals. Each memorial collection offers a brief historical background on how it became part of the collection of St Petersburg University.
For reference: St Petersburg University has launched clickable tours of: the Modern Sculpture Park; the Twelve Collegia building; the University building on 22nd Line of Vasilyevsky Island; the Dmitri Mendeleev Museum and Archives; the Vladimir Nabokov Museum; the Kelch mansion; the places of Alexander Blok at St Petersburg University; and the Bobrinsky Palace.