Colecţia de roci şi minerale Prezentarea colecţiei de roci şi minerale. Revenire în publicaţii Realizator: Dr. Andrei Kiss - cercetător ştiinţific Text: Dr. Andrei Kiss - cercetător ştiinţific Traducere: Eduard Németh Foto: Liviu Tulbure Anul apariţiei: noiembrie 2003, Ediţia a II-a 2004

The rocks and minerals collection The rocks and minerals collection of the Natural Sciences Department of the Banat Museum from Timisoara is the richest collection of its kind in South-Western Romania. It contains over 3000 samples from the old Miners Districts of the Banat and Baia Mare and also from other parts of the world, such as Europe, Ural Mountains, India, America etc. The majority of the fine and ornamental stones of this collection come from abroad. The collection was formed along the last 125 years through gathering, exchanges and purchases. Its bases were set by forerunners like Ferenc Füilepp (1830-1874) and Ede Themak (1838-1907), both of them teachers and members of the "Society of Natural Sciences" from Timisoara (1873-1918). An important part of the collection comes from the minerals collector Ocna de Fier, Constantin Gruescu. The collection is representative for the Banat, as it contains series of samples from this region and it is also very interesting from the point of view of the mineralogy. So are the pieces from the mines of Ocna de Fier, Dognecea and Moldova Noua, crystals of iron, lune spar with over 100 combinations of shapes etc. In the Banat were found and described for the first time new minerals, locus tipicus, like the andradite (1800 in Ocna de Fier), the sascaite (1870 in Sasca Montana), the ludwigite and the veszelyte (1874 in Ocna de Fier), the dognecite (1884 in Dognecea), the warthaite (1925 in Ocna de Fier) and the ciclovaite (1948 in Ciclova). Constantin Gruescu found in 1972 in Ocna de Fier for the first time a new form of the quartz made, which is coaxial with radial growths and with double and triple macles. This form was named "the Gruescu Macle". The minerals collection is presented to the visitors in the permanent exhibition of the Natural Sciances Departament. Another part of it forms itinerant exhibitions, but the majority of the samples forms the scientific collection for the study of the mineralogy of the Banat, comparative studies etc.