Witherite

The occurrence of witherite was first recorded by Strunz et al. (1958a), who simply noted its presence in the second oxidation zone. Strunz and Tennyson (1967) alluded to its rarity. Lombaard et al. (1986) listed witherite as "very rare" but without further comment. Gebhard (1999), however, did not include witherite in his list of mineral species occurring at Tsumeb, and Von Bezing et al. (2007, 2016) noted that Gebhard doubted the original identification.

Pinch and Wilson (1977) commented that witherite "… forms milky grayish masses and minute white to cream-colored crystals of flat pseudo-hexagonal dipyramidal habit" and added that it is "… found rarely in the lower oxidation zone."

Witherite forms milky, cream-coloured or pale yellow dipyramidal crystals that are easily confused with mimetite or with aragonite (var. tarnowitzite). Witherite appears to form quite late in the supergene paragenesis. A specimen in the Southwood Collection (MS 2021.025) shows the following paragenesis:

wulfenite >> calcite >> copper >> witherite >> cuprite.