Spessartine

Spessartine is a nesosilicate, manganese aluminium garnet species with the formula Mn3Al2(SiO4)3, sometimes mistakenly called spessartite. Its name is a derivative of Spessart in Bavaria, Germany, the type locality of the mineral. It occurs most often in granite pegmatite and allied rock types and in certain low-grade metamorphic phyllites. Spessartine of an orange-yellow has been called Mandarin garnet and is found in Madagascar, and violet-red spessartines are found in rhyolites in Colorado and Maine. In this atlas it is the mineral species that spessartine and Mandarin garnet gemstones record.