CHAPTER 7
DOUBLE-ENDED CRYSTALS
Picture #50
4-inch-long Namibia, Africa Double-ended Amethyst
A “double ended” or “double terminated” crystal has one major point on each end.
These crystals are complete unto themselves; they have reached a point of perfection on both tips.
These are called DT (double terminated) crystals and can grow while floating in the center of a pool of melted quartz.
They may have no attachment points , which are called “floater crystals.”
Other double-enders may perch on another rock or crystal point, with one tiny spot for anchoring.
The energetic essence of DT crystals is to connect opposites and bring all situations into balance.
A “double terminator” can help pull out blocked energies from your body.
You can also use it to clear your living space through creating a vortex of energy.
When used in healing, the energy heals in two directions – towards your client and right back to you.
Picture #51
3-inch-wide Crevice of Rust-coated Clear Arkansas Quartz
I have mined crystals at 24 locations in Arkansas.
My best digging day ever was when I found a batch of DT crystals.
At Miller Mountain, Arkansas, I found the miners had opened up a crack in the earth that was lined with crystals.
The crack was about three inches wide and three feet high, with crystals projecting into the cave on both sides.
I asked the miners if I could take pictures before they removed the crystals.
They eventually got bored and wandered away.
The last miner to leave gave me a pry bar and said I could dig some crystals.
I tried to pry some crystals off the walls and had no luck whatsoever.
I was about to give up when I noticed some tiny crystals sticking out of the clay at the bottom of the pocket.
Using a screwdriver instead of the pry-bar, I started scraping out the mud.
The sticky red clay had thousands of little double-ended crystals in it.
Nothing was larger than my pinky finger.
I ended up filling two half-bushel baskets with double-ended crystals.
That was almost 100 pounds of small crystals!
When I washed off the clay, I was left with almost 5,000 exquisite little crystals that were perfect for use in jewelry.
The miners let me keep everything, for which I am eternally grateful.
I had a lot of fun and I made a lot of money from an hour’s digging.
Picture #52
Broken and Eroded Brazilian Crystal Point with Hints of Faceting
This beat up crystal had a very tough life and a very special destiny.
It came from Brazil and must have endured severe damage while bouncing around in a pile of rocks in a pickup truck.
It is almost four inches long and has a shattered tip on one end.
So why is it in the section on double ended crystals?
I put together before and after pictures of this crystal.
In this “before picture,” you can see all the damage that was inflicted on this poor stone.
The next photograph shows the perfection of the crystal after my friend Dr. Vladimir Klipov had a chance to work on it.
Instead of cutting and polishing the crystal, he convinced it to start growing again!
Vlad used a commercial autoclave vat that is usually dedicated to growing electronic quartz.
He is the first man in history to replicate the double ended crystals
and intricate clusters that Mother Nature creates in the ground.
In the picture below, you can see the perfection of the new facets.
Dr. Vlad proved that a fairly large crystal, in this case four inches long, could be used as a “seed” for new crystal growth.
In the undisturbed conditions of a laboratory autoclave (a giant pressure cooker), the crystals take on a high degree of atomic precision, clarity and perfection.
Picture #53
Re-grown 4-inch-long Brazilian Crystal Point
Dr. Klipov’s re-grown double-ended quartz.
The world’s first combination of nature’s quartz enhanced by laboratory growth.
Picture #54
Large Quartz Cluster from the Arkansas Old Coleman Mine
Some double-ended crystals grow to immense sizes.
Here’s a photo of a 200-pound Arkansas cluster with a 30-pound perfect double-ended crystal on one side.
This crystal has been washed and cleaned to remove clay and rust.
Nothing else has been done to it.
All the faceting and large flat surfaces are completely natural, not polished.
You can see the startling clarity in the double-ended crystal at the top.
At other places on this cluster, there are more double-enders.
Even though the piece is quite large and thick, the crystal is so clear that a light bulb shines all the way through it.
One of my friends bought a double-ended crystal in Brazil that was six feet long!
It had a rough surface, so his artisans ended up polishing the entire giant stone into a 600-pound gem.
Another lapidary team polished an 800-pound double-ender from Africa.
That is the largest double I ever saw!
Take a look below.
Picture #55
Bahi’a, a Giant African Rutilated Quartz Crystal
“Bahia” is a rutilated citrine quartz from Nigeria, 600 pounds of clear quartz with gold-colored titanium crystal fibers inside.
Picture #56
12-inch-long Partly Polished Brazilian Citrine Quartz
Occasionally, double-ended crystals occur in different colors.
Here is a 12-inch Brazilian golden quartz crystal with shades of both clear quartz and smoky quartz blended with the gold citrine.
Some of the facets are naturally striated while others have been polished.
This makes it difficult to determine if the crystal was originally double ended or not.
If it was a large single point that was broken on one end, polishing could turn it into a simulated double-ender.
By studying the earlier photos of striations, you will get some tips on how to determine whether your crystal is 100% natural or whether it has been worked on.
Neither one, however, is “better” than the other.
Some natural crystals have rough, frosty or dirty surfaces that obscure the interior views.
Some polished crystals have incredibly clear “windows” that give you perfect visibility of the delicate patterns inside the quartz.
It is a judgment call whether you prefer one or the other or both.
Picture #57
6-inch-long Completely Polished Brazilian Quartz
With Double-ended Green Phantoms
Many years ago, I was asked to assess the value of a crystal collection for an estate sale.
Two of the stones looked like this beautiful green chlorite clay-included quartz crystal.
I always thought it would be great to find a similar green phantom double-ender.
Ten years later, one of my Brazilian suppliers called and said he had a batch of green-phantom double-enders.
Was I interested in getting any of them?
Yes, I was interested in getting all of them!
I ended up buying 50 double-ended green crystals at one time, an unheard-of opportunity.
Here is one of the best examples of that particular batch from Minas Gerais, Brazil.
The golden hand statue is life-size, very similar to the size of my own hands.
This gives you an idea of the magnitude of this specimen.
When these green crystals come out of the ground, orange and green clay coats the outside of the stones to the point where they are completely opaque.
There is no way to tell what is inside them until they are properly cleaned, cut and polished.
Picture #58
Chlorite and Rust Coating on a 4-inch-long Partly Polished Brazilian Quartz
Because of the rough exteriors on these green phantoms, they are always polished at the Brazilian crystal factories.
In this batch of crystals, there was one crystal, and only one crystal, that had a naturally encrusted side left on it.
That one is pictured above.
By polishing all the sides of these crystals, we get to see a variety of 18 different views of the interior.
As you turn the crystal, the inter-relationships of the green layers within the clear quartz create amazing patterns.
These look like rafters, pyramids and complicated layered shapes.
While this green-phantom mine produced a tremendous number of single-ended crystals, perhaps one out of every 100 crystals was a double-ender.
When the crystals were cleaned and polished, the miners decided not to create any simulated double-enders out of the single-enders.
Natural double-enders have double-ended green-phantom layers in them.