OLIVINE

This article appears in Volume V20, Page 89 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: NUM-ORC

OLIVINE , a rock-forming

mineral

MINERAL

composed of magnesium and ferrous crthosilicate, the

formula

being (Mg, Fe)sSiO4. The name olivine, proposed by A. G. Werner in 1790, alludes to the olive-green colour commonly shown by the

mineral

MINERAL

. The transparent varieties, or " precious olivine " used in jewelry, are known as chrysolite (q.v.) and peridot (q.v.). The term olivine is often applied incorrectly by jewellers to various green stones.
Olivine crystallizes in the orthorhombic system, but distinctly developed crystals are comparatively rare, the mineral more often occurring as compact or granular masses or as grains and blebs embedded in the igneous rocks of which it forms a constituent part. There are indistinct cleavages parallel to the macropinacoid (M in the fig.) and the brachypinacoid. The hardness is 6,1; and the sp. gr. 3.27-3.37, but reaching 3.57 in the highly ferruginous variety known as hyalosiderite. The amount of ferrous

oxide

OXIDE

varies from 5 (about 9 % in the gem varieties to 30 % in hyalosiderite. The depth of the green, or yellowish-brown colour, also varies with the amount of iron. The lustre is vitreous. The indices of refraction ( 1.66 and 1.70) and the

double

refraction are higher than in many other rock-forming minerals; and these characters, together with the indistinct cleavage, enable the mineral to be readily distinguished in thin rock-sections under the microscope. The mineral is decomposed by hot hydrochloric acid with separation of gelatinous silica. Olivine often contains small amounts of nickel and titanium dioxide; the latter replaces silica, and in the variety known as titan-olivine reaches 5%.
Olivine is a common constituent of many basic and ultrabasic rocks, such as basalt, diabase, gabbro and peridotite: the dunite, of Dun Mountain near Nelson in New Zealand, is an almost pure olivine-rock. In basalts it is often present as small porphyritic crystals or as large granular aggregates. It also occurs as an accessory constituent of some granular dolomitic limestones and crystalline schists. With

enstatite

ENSTATITE

it forms the bulk of the material of meteoric stones; and in another type of meteorites large blebs of glassy olivine fill spaces in a cellular mass of metallic iron.
Olivine is especially liable to alteration into serpentine (hydrated magnesium silicate) ; the alteration proceeds from the outside of the crystals and grains or along irregular cracks in their interior, and gives rise to the separation of iron oxides and an irregular net-

work

WORK

of fibrous serpentine, which in rock-sections presents a very characteristic appearance. Large greenish-yellow crystals from Snarum in Buskerud, Norway, at one time thought to be crystals of serpentine, really consist of serpentine pseudomorphous after olivine. Many of the large rock-masses of
serpentine have been derived by the serpentinization of olivine-rocks. Olivine also sometimes alters, especially in crystalline schists, to a fibrous, colourless amphibole, to which the name
pilite has been given. By

ordinary

ORDINARY (med. Lat. ordinarius, Fr. ordinaire)

weathering processes it alters to limop.ite and silica.
Closely related to olivine are several other species, which are included together in the olivine group : they have the orthosilicate

formula

R"2SiO4, where R" represents calcium, magnesium, iron, manganese and rarely zinc; they all crystallize in the orthorhombic system, and are isomorphous with olivine. The following may be mentioned
Monticellite, CaMgSiOs, a rare mineral occurring as yellowish-grey crystals and grains in granular limestone at Monte Solnma,

Vesuvius

VESUVIUS (also Vesevus in ancient poets)

.
Forsterite, Mg2SiOs, as colourless or yellowish grains embedded in many. crystalline limestones.
Fayalte, Fe2SiO4, or iron olivine is dark brown or black in colour. It occurs as nodules in a volcanic rock at

Fayal

FAYAL (Faial)

in the Azores, and in granite at the Mourne Mountains in Ireland; and as small crystals in cavities in rhyolite at the Yellowstone Park, U.S.A. It is a common constituent of crystalline iron slags.
Tephroite, Mn2SiO4, a grey (rm4p6s, ash-coloured), cleavable mineral occurring with other manganiferous minerals in Sweden and New

Jersey

JERSEY
JERSEY, EARLS OF

. (L. J. S.)

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