History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c17.s2.t1: Bead Industry of Chanhu-daro
History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c17.s2.t1
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Bead Industry of Chanhu-daro
v1.c17.s2.t1.1
The Chanhu-daro Harappan site showed not only metals such as copper and bronze but also the manufacture of a wide variety of mineral and gem-beads. Different types of beads have been unearthed from Chanhu-daro in course of excavation. Among the numerous specimens, many were found unfinished, broken in boring or rejected on account of bad colour and the like, thus proving these were locally made and not imported.
v1.c17.s2.t1.2
Agate and carnelian were the materials most generally used in the manufacture of beads during this period, carnelian being decidedly the rarer. Somewhat less common were faience, vitreous paste, steatite and products made out of it. Beads made of other materials were copper or bronze, shell, lapis-lazuli, jasper, a variety of hornblend, crystal, quartz, Amazon stone, chalcedony, limestone, onyx, fuchsite-quartzite, haematite, breccia, plasma; no amethyst bead was found. Thus, it is proven from all the beads discovered at Chanhu-daro, that the site was undoubtedly a great bead-making centre. Most of these beads came from the quarters of the craftsmen who made them, not only for themselves but also for distant cities.
v1.c17.s2.t1.3
On a broader perspective, Horace Beck (1933 & 1941) placed the Indus beads under the following three headings: I. White on red, the most common type, I. Black on a white coloured base, III. Black on a red ground. Among these, only two types i.e. I and II have come to light at Chanhu-daro.
v1.c17.s2.t1.4
The patterns of the Type I beads were made by using as paint a coat of alkali, such as carbonate of soda and then fixing it by heat. The paint is left with a glossy white surface and adheres to the stone so firmly that it is almost impossible to remove it by simple means. The technique is still carried on in Persia, on the borders of China and sporadically in Sindh. In the last province, the juice of a plant is mixed with alkali, presumably to keep it from flaking off the stone before it has been made fast by heat.
v1.c17.s2.t1.5
It is uncertain what medium was used to produce the black coloured patterns on the type II beads. The white back-ground was formed by flooding the red carnelian with the alkali, thus creating a white opaque surface. According to Horace Beck it is also possible that a copper solution was used as the paint. Thus to apply fine and even lines and firing on the beads, the greatest skill must have been required.
v1.c17.s2.t1.6
Two unfinished beads of lapis lazuli prove that this stone was actually worked upon at Chanhu-daro; the finished specimens are not therefore likely to be importations. The source of this mineral is thought to be Badakshan, while new provenances for amazonite is to be found in the pegmatites near Jhajha (Monghyr Dist., Bihar), the Nellore district, Madras and Ahmedabad.
v1.c17.s2.t1.7
The two beads of fuchsite-quartzite are particularly interesting, because this rare mineral was never used at Mohenjo-daro. A large cup, carved in almost pure fuchsite was found there, together with a collection of copper and bronze tools and other objects. The colour of this stone is light green and its source is most probably Mysore.
v1.c17.s2.t1.8
Four wafer-shaped mother-of-pearl beads were unearthed from Chanhu-daro. Beads of this particular substance are very rare at Mohenjo-daro. Jade does not seem to have been used at Chanhu-daro, and this statement also applies to various other stones that were used for bead at Mohenjo-daro. A large number of nodules of carnelian and agate were discovered from Chanhu-daro - the former being as a rule easily distinguishable from the latter by the darkness of its skin.
v1.c17.s2.t1.9
The carnelian beads were made from roughly flaked stone blanks averaging 0.58 inch in diameter and 0.21 inch thick. Each of these beads has been bored with a chert drill. All the holes were splintered rather than cut, and were necessarily smoothed down and polished later. Before this was done however, the heads were shaped by grinding. A number of these were probably stung on a thread, or more likely on a piece of copper wire, and then rolled to and fro on grit-stones of various grades, each bead being allowed sufficient play for its rounded edge to be properly formed.
v1.c17.s2.t1.10
The agate beads had first been severed from the parent nodule by sawing and then by splitting. The shaping of barrel-cylinder type was carried out entirely by careful flaking. When all depressions and irregularities had been smoothed away by grinding, the object was then polished. Before this final finish took place, the bead had to be bored, a process that was carried out from both ends by means of drill.
v1.c17.s2.t1.11
Quite significantly, broken drills were found everywhere in Mound II and though these might have served again in the boring of the shorter hardstone beads, it is obvious that the drill-makers, if indeed the bead-makers did not manufacture their own tools, must have been hard put to supply the demand. Though unfinished beads of hard stones have been found on many Sumerian sites, only one stone drill has been found in that country. This was identified by Beck among some objects from Ur. Thus Mackay comments “indeed it is not at all unlikely that bead-making in Sumer was carried on by Indian craftsmen”.
v1.c17.s2.t1.12
The segmented beads have appeared over such a wide area in India, that it is quite impossible to say where the type originated. Indeed such a simple form of bead need not have had a particular region of origin at all. At Chanhu-daro as well as Mohenjo-daro, such beads were produced by a kind of mass production. These were made in long rods which after glazing were to be divided into segments of uniform length. The rods found at Chanhu-daro were too long and too delicate to have been used for any other purpose than to be broken into convenient lengths.