Powder and single-crystal optical absorption of the ferrimagnet Mn
IICu
II(pba)(H
2O)
3·2H
2O (denoted MnCu) andthe Mn-doped compound Mn
0.1Mg
0.9Cu(pba)(H
2O)
3·2H
2O (denoted Mn
0.1Mg
0.9Cu) with pba standing for 1,3-propylenebis(oxamato) was investigated in the 10-300 K range. The crystal structure of MnCu was previouslyreported, and consists of bimetallic chains with octahedral Mn
II and square pyramidal Cu
II ions linked by oxamatobridges, MnCu and Mn
0.1Mg
0.9Cu being isostructural. The spectra of both MnCu and Mn
0.1Mg
0.9Cu show animportant dichroism along the chain direction, due to the strong polarization of the Cu
II band at around 16 000cm
-1 in this direction. They exhibit narrow and intense spin-forbidden Mn
II transitions in the 24000-25000cm
-1 range, which are activated by an exchange mechanism. The polarization and thermal dependence of the
6A
1g
4A
1g,
4E
g(G) Mn
II transitions were recorded. The polarization along the chain axis was interpreted in theframework of the pair mechanism first introduced by Tanabe and co-workers. A theoretical expression for thethermal dependence of the intensity was derived by considering the Cu
II spin as a quantum spin and the Mn
II spinas a classical spin, and compared with the experimental data. The interaction parameter between the local groundstates has been found to be
J = -25 cm
-1 using the spin Hamiltonian
H = -
J
i(
SMn,isCu,i +
SMn,i+1sCu,i). Thespectra of Mn
0.1Mg
0.9Cu showed cold and hot bands, whose energy difference is directly related to
J and theinteraction parameter
J* between the Cu
II ion in its ground state and the Mn
II ion in its spin-flip excited state.
J*has been estimated to be +40 cm
-1. These results have been compared to those obtained with other Mn
IICu
IIcompounds. The complementarity between optical and magnetic properties has been discussed.