Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Marble
A metamorphosed limestone of interlocking calcite crystals, prized for sculpture and architecture for its workability and polish.
metamorphicOnyx Marble
Translucent banded calcium-carbonate stone deposited in caves and springs, prized for ornamental carvings despite its softness.
sedimentary
Parian Marble
A pure, translucent white marble from the Greek island of Paros, the preferred stone of ancient sculptors for its waxy glow.
metamorphic
Cipollino Marble
A green-and-white banded metamorphic marble whose wavy mica layers resemble the rings of a sliced onion.
metamorphicPentelic Marble
The fine white marble of Mount Pentelikon used to build the Parthenon, famous for the golden patina it develops with age.
metamorphicCarrara Marble
A famous white to blue-grey Italian marble from Carrara, prized for centuries by sculptors and architects for its purity and fine grain.
metamorphic
Green Marble
A green ornamental stone, often serpentine-rich marble or verde antique, valued for its rich green color and white veining.
metamorphic
Bumblebee Jasper
A vivid yellow-and-black banded stone from Indonesian volcanic vents, colored by sulfur, arsenic minerals and iron oxides, not true jasper.
sedimentaryPicasso Jasper
A marbled, abstractly patterned stone resembling modern art, technically a metamorphosed limestone rather than a true silica jasper.
metamorphic
Desert Rose
A rosette-shaped cluster of bladed gypsum or barite crystals that traps sand, forming flower-like formations in arid deserts.
mineralAlabaster
A soft, fine-grained, translucent form of gypsum (or banded calcite) long prized as a carving and ornamental stone.
mineral
Calc-schist
A foliated metamorphic rock of calcite mixed with mica, quartz, and calc-silicate minerals, derived from marly sediments.
metamorphic
Lapis Lazuli
An intensely blue metamorphic rock of lazurite flecked with golden pyrite, prized for millennia as a gemstone and ultramarine pigment.
metamorphic
Chalk
A soft, white, fine-grained limestone made almost entirely of microscopic marine plankton skeletons.
sedimentary
Carbonatite
A rare igneous rock made mostly of carbonate minerals, source of the world's most important rare-earth-element and niobium deposits.
igneous
Tufa
A porous, spongy freshwater limestone that precipitates around springs, streams and lakes, often encrusting plants and moss.
sedimentary
Limestone
A soft carbonate sedimentary rock made mostly of calcite, often packed with marine fossils and prone to forming caves.
sedimentary
Fossiliferous Limestone
Calcium-carbonate sedimentary rock packed with visible fossils, recording ancient marine life within an easily scratched, fizzing matrix.
sedimentary
Geode
A hollow rock nodule whose interior cavity is lined with inward-pointing crystals such as quartz, amethyst, or calcite.
mineral
Septarian Concretion
A rounded sedimentary nodule cracked internally and filled with veins of yellow calcite, prized for its striking dragon-skin patterning.
sedimentary
Calcarenite
Sand-grained limestone composed of carbonate particles such as shell fragments and ooids cemented into a calcite rock.
sedimentary
Siderite
Siderite is an iron carbonate ore, a brown rhombohedral mineral of the calcite group found in sediments and veins.
mineral
Bytownite
A calcium-rich plagioclase feldspar between labradorite and anorthite, faceted as transparent golden-yellow gems sometimes sold as yellow labradorite.
gemstone
Anhydrite
A water-free calcium sulfate mineral closely related to gypsum, forming in evaporite deposits and swelling into gypsum when it absorbs water.
mineral