Koller - Out of This World Tuesday, 28 June 2022, 4pm

1892 TWANNBERGMETEORITE Found: 6 May 2017 Fall: around 200‘000 years Coordinates 2‘575‘442 / 1‘219‘631, Official meteorite name: TW 896 20 x 5 x 7 cm 404 gm Provenance: - Swiss private collection (from the finder) About 200‘000 years ago, a tremendous spectacle must have taken place in the sky above the Twannberg and the adjacent Jura heights. Chunks of iron rained down in rough quantities. Today it is considered certain that the asteroid measured 4 to 20 meters in diameter before the explosion and weighed at least 250 tons. Scientists of the Natural History Museum of Bern, the Physics Institute of the University of Bern as well as several private meteorite collectors have explored the Twannberg strewn field in the last years. The Twannberg strew field, together with Morasko (Poland) or Muonionalusta (northern Sweden), is one of the largest and most important iron strew fields in Europe. In Switzerland the Twann- berg meteorite is the largest of eight known meteorites and at the same time the only one fromwhich several fragments are known. Twannberg belongs within the group of iron meteorites to one of the rarest classes. So only six specimens of this iron meteorite type, which is characterized by a very low nickel content and a high phosphorus content, exist worldwide. The piece presented here is one of the most beautiful meteorites from the Twannberg. The graceful shape, the size as well as the stability and consistency of the iron (many Twannberg meteorites are in a rather desolate condition and rust very badly, after 200‘000 years in the ground) make this piece one of the most important Swiss finds of all time. CHF 9 500 / 12 000 (€ 9 220 / 11 650) | 96 Out of This World | Natural History, Space Exploration & Entertainment Memorabilia