Talk:Sunstone

redlinked at List of U.S. state minerals, rocks, stones and gemstones
I'm not sure how to fix this. it's called "Oregon sunstone" at List of U.S. state minerals, rocks, stones and gemstonesRvannatta 00:31, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * We need to either create a separate page or redirect the page here. Let's see if the article improvement drive adds enough info to justify a separate page. Katr67 08:09, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I went ahead and made a redirect. Katr67 18:26, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Travel info
I was out to the BLM digging site a couple of years ago. Wish I had a photo or two but didn't take them then, and it is a ways out there. Best road is from Plush which is itself hard to get to, If you are going south out of Burns on 395 it is much shorter to enter the area from the north end but the road is suitible for only hardy 4x4's. Rvannatta 03:05, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Viking sunstone
It is only so-called sunstone and is a different mineral than the one this article is about. Though a mention and link to the relevant article would be good, I don't think this article needs to go into so much detail about it, and that the info should be moved to the Iceland spar article. Katr67 08:09, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Hearing no objection, I moved the info. Katr67 18:26, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Refs for improvement

 * From Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries: Learn more about Oregon's geology: Oregon Sunstone


 * From BLM: About Lakeview


 * The Travel Channel also did a show on Sunstones: Sunstones: Treasure Hunt Toolkit

There are quite a few articles out there by amateur rockhounders and people running BLM mining claims, like this one entitled "Hunting the Beautiful Oregon Sunstone" (which happens to be on the spam blacklist so I can't link to it): http://ezinearticles.com/?Hunting-the-Beautiful-Oregon-Sunstone&id=589648 --I'm not sure which can be called reliable sources (not this one, obviously) since many of them have a commercial bent, but with some digging (no pun intended) we should be able to find a lot more material for expansion. Katr67 17:01, 12 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Here's the text of the 1911 stuff, if anyone is curious what part has been copied from there. Note the language used may be a bit archaic and the info out of date.


 * "Sunstone, a felspar exhibiting in certain directions a brilliant spangled appearance, which has led to its use as an ornamental stone. The effect appears to be due to reflections from enclosures of red haematite, in the form of minute scales, which are hexagonal, rhombic or irregular in shape, and are disposed parallel to the principal cleavage-plane. These enclosures give the stone an appearance something like that of aventurine, whence sunstone is known also as 'aventurine-felspar.' It is not common, the best-known locality being Tvedestrand, near Arendal, in south Norway, where masses of the sunstone occur embedded in a vein of quartz running through gneiss. It is found also near Lake Baikal, in Siberia, and at several localities in the United States, notably at Middletown, Delaware county, Pennsylvania, and at Statesville in North Carolina. The felspar which usually displays the aventurine appearance is oligoclase, but the effect is sometimes seen also in orthoclase: hence two kinds of sunstone are distinguished as 'oligoclase sunstone' and 'orthoclase sunstone.' The latter has been found near Crownpoint and at several other localities in the state of New York, as also at Glen Riddle in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, and at Amelia Court House, Amelia County, Virginia."


 * Katr67 18:26, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
 * LARRY BINGHAM. Romancing the state's stones What's become of our geologic bounty says as much about our past as our future. The Sunday Oregonian, October 28, 2007. A newer one. Aboutmovies (talk) 01:53, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Use in Viking-era navigation
When I saw this on the Tvedestrand article I followed the link here; I used to have a coffee-table book called The Vikings (I think a Nat'l geographic publication; maybe I still have it, but it would be in storage) that had a picture of a Viking-era one and explained that sunstone was used in navigation in Viking-era Scandinavia, i.e. for locating the sun on overcast days. I wouldn't know the page ref but if I can find a ref for the book I'll add mention of it.Skookum1 (talk) 14:53, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Viking sunstone or calcite
I've chopped the following as it is about the mineral calcite and discussed at Sunstone (medieval) and Iceland spar.
 * The name derives from sunstones believed to have been used for navigation in the Middle Ages because their optical properties allow the azimuth of the sun to be detected even when the sun is below the horizon, with an accuracy within a degree or so. A stone found in the Thames amid the wreckage of a 16th century warship in 2002 may lend evidence of the existence of sunstones as navigational devices.


 * Use as a compass
 * Calcite from Iceland is also referred to as sunstone.
 * While there continues to be dispute among scientists, a sunstone (from Iceland) found in 2002 in the wreck of a 16th-century British ship was announced in 2013 as a Viking compass.
 * Although the stone was found near a navigational instrument, its use remains uncertain.