Zincaluminite

The place where the mineral was first found and described — by convention, the reference point for the species.

Resistance to being scratched, ranked on the Mohs scale from 1 (talc, marked by a fingernail) to 10 (diamond, scratches everything below it). The classic field test.

Whether and how much light passes through a mineral, from transparent (you can see through it) to translucent, then opaque.

The hue of the mineral itself. Often unreliable for identification — many species occur in several colours depending on trace impurities or radiation damage.

Mass per unit volume, in grams per cubic centimetre. A useful sorting tool: barite is twice as dense as quartz at the same size.

Whether the mineral is isotropic (light travels at one speed in all directions, like in glass) or anisotropic — uniaxial or biaxial. Defines which optical tests apply.

How much light bends as it enters the mineral. Higher index means stronger bending — diamond's extreme index is why it sparkles.

How sharply a grain stands out against the mounting medium (Canada balsam, n ≈ 1.54) under the petrographic microscope. Low relief means the grain almost dissolves into the slide; very high relief gives crisp, almost three-dimensional outlines.

The refractive indices measured along the crystal's principal optical axes — nω and nε for uniaxial minerals, nα, nβ, and nγ for biaxial.

The overall shape and habit a mineral tends to grow into — cubes, prisms, plates, fibres, druses, masses.

The crystal habit observed at the type locality — the place where the mineral was first described.