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Formula: Cu10Fe4SnAsS16
Sulphide, tin- and arsenic-
bearing mineral
Crystal System: Tetragonal
Specific gravity: 4.29 calculated
Hardness: 4½
Colour: Orange
Common impurities: Zn
Environments
Vinciennite occurs associated with pyrite,
chalcopyrite, colusite,
stannite, stannoidite,
mawsonite, bornite,
enargite,
tetrahedrite-tennantite,
quartz and baryte
(HOM).
Localities
At the Radka Mine, Levski, Panagyurishte Municipality, Pazardzhik Province, Bulgaria, the assemblage in the
vinciennite-bearing high-sulphidation epithermal deposit consists of
enargite, copper-excess
tennantite, chalcopyrite,
gold, vinciennite, colusite and
minor covellite, within a gangue of
baryte, illite and
quartz. The assemblage was formed by oxidised and slightly acid fluids at a
temperature of about 275o C
(CM 42.1501-1521).
At the Maggie Mine, Cache Creek, Kamloops Mining Division, British Columbia, Canada, the copper sulphides in the
copper-molybdenum zone have a
zonal arrangement in which a core of chalcopyrite plus minor
bornite progresses outward to
chalcopyrite, then to
chalcopyrite +/- tennantite;
peripheral to these is the assemblage tennantite -
sphalerite - galena. Veinlets of
the peripheral assemblage are late in the depositional sequence and cut the
copper-molybdenum mineralisation
and some pyrite veinlets.
In one drillhole the peripheral assemblage was found to occur in quartz -
pyrite veinlets. The veinlet pyrite is
coarsely crystalline and contains scattered blebs of pyrrhotite.
Tennantite occurs abundantly along the boundary of
pyrite grains. Associated with some of the
tennantite are intergrowths of
chalcopyrite-bornite and lesser
amounts of chalcopyrite-bornite-digenite.
Also present are small amounts of galena and
sphalerite; as well, small scattered grains of
tin-bearing sulphides, one of which is vinciennite, occur sparingly in the
other sulphides, especially tennantite
(CM 25.227-228).
At the type locality, the Chizeuil Mine, Chalmoux, Charolles, Saône-et-Loire, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, France,
vinciennite occurs as grains up to 1 mm in size associated with minerals of the
tetrahedrite subgroup and
tennantite subgroup, and with
stannite, quartz,
pyrite, enargite,
colusite, bornite and
albite
(Mindat).
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