History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c34.s3.3

v1.c34.s3.3

The tools and implements of goldsmith are few and simple. The apparatus for heating and melting the metals include a furnace (angethā), crucibles (gharyā) blowpipe (nāl or phuṅkanī) and small curved blowpipes (bangual). After melting the metal the Sunār uses a long narrow trough with a handle known as reza or Pargahani with which he converts the metal into a long bar. For hammering, there is an anvil (nihai) and the hammer (hathaurā). He has various long and small tongs (cimṭā or cimṭi), pincers (samsī or Zambūrī), scissors (katrīs), file (retī) and the chisels (chhenī) to do his job. For drawing wires, the Sunār uses the wire-drawer (Jantra), which is an iron plate perforated with circular holes of different sizes through which the metal bar is drawn out until it is gradually reduced to the thickness of an ordinary wire. A cube (kensulā) of brass or bell metal (kānsa) with circular hollows at the side is used to hammer out the small plates of metal into separate halves of round ornaments, such as the ghungru (small chain bells), which are appended to the chains, bracelets and anklets. There are the dies (thāppā) of various shapes and sizes required for ornaments. The dies are used to bring out the patterns by hammering and heating. The dies are named after ornaments such as the thāppā cūri (a bracelet mould) and thāppā tābiz (amulet mould) and so on.