History
Few minerals wear their birthplace as plainly as shattuckite. The deep-blue copper mineral takes its name straight from the Shattuck Mine at Bisbee, in the copper country of southern Arizona, where it was first found in 1915.
It belongs to the copper silicates — minerals built from copper, silicon and oxygen. It is a secondary mineral, meaning it does not crystallise from fresh magma but forms later, when water and air alter copper minerals already in the ground. At the Shattuck Mine it grew by replacing malachite, the common green copper carbonate, atom for atom while keeping the original crystal's outward shape. A replacement of that kind is a pseudomorph — a false form, one mineral wearing another's outline.
In the rock it usually shows up as a solid blue mass, sometimes as fine needle-like crystals — acicular is the mineralogist's word — gathered into tiny radiating balls. Those forms, and its colour, made it easy to confuse with the closely related blue mineral plancheite, which it resembles in both structure and appearance.
Industrial & practical applications
Shattuckite has no industrial job. It is far too rare to be mined for its copper, and nothing in modern industry depends on it. Its one practical use is ornamental: the solid blue masses are sometimes cut and polished as a gemstone.
Beyond that, shattuckite is mostly a collector's mineral. It is sought for its deep blue colour and for its tie to the famous copper mines of Bisbee, Arizona, rather than for anything done with it.
Where it forms, where it's found
- Geological setting
A secondary mineral in an oxidized copper deposit.
Oxidation zone in copper deposits
- Type locality
- Shattuck Mine
- Bisbee
- Cochise County
- Arizona
- USA
31.4331°, -109.9167°
Physical
- Hardness
- 1Talc
- 2Gypsum
- 3Calcite
- 4Fluorite
- 5Apatite
- 6Orthoclase
- 7Quartz
- 8Topaz
- 9Corundum
- 10Diamond
- Transparency
- Translucent
- Colour
- Light to dark blue.
- Cleavage
- Perfect
on (010) (100)
- Density
- 4.11 g/cm³
Optical
- Optical type
- Biaxial (+) · 2V calc = 88°
- Refractive index
- 1.753 – 1.815
- Surface relief
- High
- Principal indices
- nα 1.753 · nβ 1.782 · nγ 1.815
- Pleochroism
- Visible
X= very pale blue Y= pale blue Z= deep blue
- Dispersion
- distinct to strong
- Extinction
- Orientation: X = b; Y = a; Z = c.
Crystallography
- Cell parameters
- a = 9.885(1) Å · b = 19.832(2) Å · c = 5.3825(8) Å
- Ratio a:b:c
- 1 : 2.006 : 0.545
- Z
- 4
- Morphology
Elongated prismatic crystals. Aggregates of spherulitic masses composed of acicular crystals. Forms include (100), (010), (110).
- Type-locality form
Pseudomorphs after malachite and as small spherulites.
- Comment
Space Group: Pcab:
Chemical composition
- Impurities
- Fe
- Mn
- Mg
- Ca
- H2O
Synonyms
- Shattukite
In other languages
- French
- Shattuckite
- German
- Shattuckit
- Spanish
- Shattuckita
- Italian
- Shattuckite
- Japanese
- シャタッカイト · シャタック石 · シャッタカイト
- Russian
- Шаттукит
Classification
9.DB.40
- 9SilicatesClass
- 9.DInosilicatesDivision
- 9.DBInosilicates with 2-periodic single chains, Si2O6; Pyroxene-related mineralsGroup
- 9.DB.40ShattuckiteSpecies
65.01.07.01
- 65Inosilicates Single-width, Unbranched Chains, (w=1)Class
- 65.01Single-Width Unbranched Chains, W=1 with chains P=2Type
- 65.01.07— unnamed intermediate level —Group
- 65.01.07.01ShattuckiteSpecies
14.2.2
- 14Silicates not Containing AluminumClass
- 14.2Silicates of CuGroup
- 14.2.2ShattuckiteSpecies
Group, growth & confusion
Literature, links & citation
- 1915Schaller, Waldemar T. (1915) Four new minerals. Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences, 5. 7
- 1918Zambonini, M.F. (1918) Minéralogie. - Sur l'identité de la shattuckite et de la planchéite. Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences: 166: 495-497.
- 1919Schaller, W.T. (1919) Plancheite and shattuckite, copper silicates, are not the same mineral. Journal of the Washington Acadamy of Science: 9: 131-134.
- 1925Hacquaert, A. (1925) Pseudomorphoses de cristaux de calcite en shattuckite, planchéite et en dioptase. Annales de la Société géologique de Belgique: 49: 90-94.
- 1930Schoep, A. (1930) Nouvelles recherches sur la planchéite et sur la shattuckite. Identité de ces deux minéraux. Remarques sur la bisbeeite et sur la katangite. Bulletin de Minéralogie: 53(1): 375-393.
@misc{mineral2026,
author = {Mineral Index editorial board},
title = {Shattuckite — Mineral Index},
year = {2026},
url = {https://mineralindex.org/minerals/shattuckite-3634},
note = {Accessed 2026-05-11}
}