Libyan desert’s yellow glass: how we discovered the origin of these rare and mysterious shards

Elizaveta Kovaleva

THE Great Sand Sea Desert stretches over an area of 72,000km² linking Egypt and Libya. If you find yourself in a particular part of the desert in south-east Libya and south-western parts of Egypt, you’ll spot pieces of yellow glass scattered across the sandy landscape.

It was first described in a scientific paper in 1933 and is known as Libyan desert glass. Mineral collectors value it for its beauty, its relative rarity – and its mystery. A pendant found in Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun’s tomb contains a piece of the glass. Natural glasses are found elsewhere in the world; examples include moldavites from the Ries crater in Europe and tektites from the Ivory Coast. But none are as rich in silica as Libyan desert glass, nor are they found in such large lumps and quantities.

The origin of the glass has been the subject of debate among scientists for