Spessartine Spessartine Spessartine, sometimes mistakenly referred to as spessartite, is a nesosilicate, manganese aluminium garnet species, MnAl(SiO). The mineral spessartine should not be confused with a type of igneous rock (a lamprophyre) called spessartite. Spessartine's name is a derivative of Spessart in Bavaria, Germany, the type locality of the mineral. It occurs most often in granite pegmatite and allied rock types and in certain low-grade metamorphic phyllites. Sources include Australia, Myanmar, India, Afghanistan, Israel, Madagascar, Namibia, Nigeria, Mozambique, Tanzania and the United States. Spessartine of an orange-yellow has been called "Mandarin garnet" and is found in Madagascar. Violet-red spessartines are found
Gemstone have the same primary chemical composition (both are corundum) but exhibit different colors because of impurities. Even the same named gemstone can occur in many different colors: sapphires show different shades of blue and pink and "fancy sapphires" exhibit a whole range of other colors from yellow to orange-pink, the latter called "padparadscha sapphire". This difference in color is based on the atomic structure of the stone. Although the different stones formally have the same chemical composition and structure, they are not exactly the same. Every now and then an atom is replaced by a completely different atom, sometimes as