Angled perspective shot of blue sodalite and white nepheline matrix.
Full front shot of blue sodalite with white nepheline crystals.
Close up horizontal view of blue sodalite with white crystals.
Macro view of golden pyrite grains embedded in blue sodalite.
Macro photograph of elongated white nepheline crystals on blue sodalite.

Sodalite & Nepheline

Sodalite – Na4(Si3Al3)O12Cl
Elements: Sodium, Silicon, Aluminum, Oxygen, Chlorine
Class: Silicates – Tectosilicates
Crystal System: Cubic
Hardness: 5.5-6
Orthoclase
Talc (1)Diamond (10)
Scratches glass. Harder than a steel knife.
Nepheline – Na3K(Al4Si4O16)
Elements: Sodium, Potassium, Aluminum, Silicon, Oxygen
Class: Silicates – Tectosilicates
Crystal System: Hexagonal
Hardness: 5.5-6
Orthoclase
Talc (1)Diamond (10)
Scratches glass. Harder than a steel knife.
Origin: Sar-e Sang, Koksha Valley – Afghanistan
Did you know?

Sodalite owes its royal blue reputation to a single royal. In 1901 the future Queen Mary was so taken with a piece of Bancroft sodalite from Ontario that quantities were later quarried and shipped to England to decorate Marlborough House in London, and the source has been called the Princess Sodalite Mine ever since.

Nepheline and quartz almost never share a rock, even though quartz is everywhere. The two cannot coexist at equilibrium: if any free silica is around as the magma cools, it reacts with the nepheline and turns it into feldspar instead, so finding the two together is a near contradiction in geology.

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