Gibeon Iron Meteorite Individual - 153g

The Gibeon meteorite comes from Namibia, a country in southern Africa.  The meteorite was discovered by the Nama people.   They, like most primitive people, used this meteorite to make tools and weapons for survival.  It wasn't until 1839, an English captain by the name of J. E. Alexander collected samples of the meteorite in the vicinity of the Fish River and sent them to London. There, another man named John Herschel, analyzed them and confirmed for the first time that this newly discovered metal was actually a meteorite.  It is called Gibeon because that was the closest town to the strewnfield. 

Between 1911 and 1913, 33 fragments of the meteorite were collected in the vicinity of a city called Gibeon and brought to the capital Windhoek. They weighed between 195 and 506 kilos (430 and 1,116 lbs.) and were first stored, then displayed at Zoo Park as a single collection for all to enjoy.  In 1975, a public fountain displaying the meteorite fragments was planned. The pieces were removed and stored at Alte Feste, where two of the fragments were stolen. The fountain was erected in Post Street Mall, with 2 empty pillars for the missing fragments. Since then, 2 more fragments were removed from the fountain, so that it displays only 29 today.  

On February 15th of 1950, the collection displayed on the fountain in Windhoek's Central Business District was proclaimed a National Monument.  The government also mandated that all meteorites found in Namibia are automatically protected as National Monuments and must not be removed from where they have been found, nor damaged in any way.

The strewnfield for Gibeon meteorites is possibly the largest in the world.  The total amount recovered so far is over 26 tons.  The Gibeon meteorites come from broken asteroid fragments or perhaps an exploded star.  Radiometric dating places the age of these meteorites at around 4 billion years old.  Gibeon was classified as a medium octahedrite iron.  Gibeon has more nickel in its metal than some other meteorites.  Because it has a higher amount of nickel with few mineral inclusions, it's a very stable meteorite and does not rust fast like others do.

The weight of this piece is 153 grams.

All of my meteorites come with a COA as well as an information card.