Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v1.c25.s6: The Antiquity of Diamond- and Gem-Mines of India

Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v1.c25.s6

Language
English

The Antiquity of Diamond- and Gem-Mines of India

v1.c25.s6.1

Diamond and other gem minerals were known and mined in India in the distant past. The evidences pertaining to the ancient period (up to AD 1200) are almost entirely literary. No C-14 dating of such ‘ancient’ workings is available. Reviewing diamond mining in India, Max Bauer (1968: 141) commented that the working of the most important deposit known at present “do not date back to very remote periods, probably in all cases subsequent to the year AD 1000 and sometimes much later”. We disagree on the basis of literary records, but we do not have specific C-14 dates or archaeological evidences to counter Bauer’s statement.

v1.c25.s6.2

In the previous two chapters (15 and 16) we have recorded the accounts of Graeco-Roman travellers regarding the Indian gems and minerals. The Vol. II of our monograph (specially chapter 7 therein) contains the references on the subject in the Sanskrit literatures—*Rgveda* to *Rasaratnasamuccaya*—spanning over a period of more than two millennia, and yet nothing can compensate the absence of C-14 and archaeological data for the possible ancient workings.

v1.c25.s6.3

The diamond mining in the nineteenth century India was reviewed by Ritter (1836), Ball (1881: 1-50) and then Max Bauer (1896: Edelsteinkunde, translated and edited in 1968). We reproduce in *fig. 17.4* the plate on the diamond-fields of India as drawn in 1896. (Bauer, 1968: 144) It was felt that the mines active at that time could have been recent or medieval rather than ancient. However, the ancient mines (before AD 1200) were probably located in the well-defined zones of southern, eastern and central India as represented in *fig 17.4*.

v1.c25.s6.4

The *Arthaśāstra* of the late fourth century BC was probably the first text to describe the Indian diamonds (*vajra*) and the mode and area of their occurrence (2.11.37-41). The mine and stream deposits were listed as their sources. The identification of the specific sites of occurrence, listed in the *Arthaśāstra*, is problematical:

v1.c25.s6.5

Sabhārāṣṭra (Vidarbha around Nagpur?), Tajjāmā-rāṣṭra (Kaliṅga ?), Kāstīrarāṣṭra, Srikaṭanaka, Manimanta and Indravana.

v1.c25.s6.6

The sixth century AD texts such as *Bṛhat Saṃhitā* (AD 505), *Ratnaparīkṣā*, *Agastimata* etc. provide informations about diamond and other gems, and their occurrences in India. We would discuss these topics in chapter 7 of Vol. II. *Bṛhat Saṃhitā* (80.6) identified the sources and the nature of sample:

v1.c25.s6.7

Veṇā river banks (purest kind), Kośala region (whitish yellow like the Śirīṣa flower), Saurāṣṭra (reddish lustre), Saurpāra (dark), Himalayan region (copper coloured), Mataṅga (pale white like the Valla blossoms), Kaliṅga (yellowish) and Pauṇḍra (black).

v1.c25.s6.8

The exact locations are controversial. The sites of Saurāṣṭra (Kāṭhiāwāḍ) and Saurpāra (Sopara) were actually ports for export trade in diamonds.

v1.c25.s6.10

Fig. 17.4: The Diamond-fields of India.

v1.c25.s6.11

The Veṇā seems to refer to Wairagadh situated on the Wainganga around which diamonds are found in lateritic grits. Wairagadh appears to have been famous for its diamonds and was consequently known as Vajrākara or Vajragṛha. (Shastri, 1969: 325) This area of Vidarbha was probably referred to as Sabhārāṣṭra in the Arthaśāstra. Bauer (1968: 150) mentioned the remains of ‘very ancient’ mines, eighty miles south-east of Nagpur on the Sath river, a tributary of the Wainganga. The mines were ‘formerly rich’ yielding diamonds of the ‘purest kind’ according to the Bṛhat Saṃhitā (BS).

v1.c25.s6.12

The Kośala region mentioned by the BS is probably South Kośala which has the 60 miles long by 10 mile wide diamond field of the former Bundelkhand area around the famous Pānnā (24⁰ 43'30" N, 80⁰15 'E). The diamantiferous stratum consists of a ferruginous clay which contains, besides diamonds, fragments of sandstone, quartz, hornstone, red jasper etc., and “deserving of special mention, a green quartz (prase), the abundant occurrence of which is considered a good sign by the diamond seekers” (Bauer, 1968: 151) We suggest the possibility that the place was named Pānnā to indicate emerald, which resembles prase, widely occurring in the area, in greenness. The 100 ft deep old diamond mine at Majgoha (Maigama) south-west of Pānnā is now a cone-shaped depression filled with green mud.

v1.c25.s6.13

In 1906, there were 36 principal localities yielding diamonds, in six separate states of Bundelkhand. Ball (1881: 40) described the nineteenth-century operation in a diamond mine 2-3 miles north-east of Pānnā. There is now a modern diamond benefication plant at Majhgawan.

v1.c25.s6.14

Matanga is the tract between the rivers Kṛṣṇa and Godāvarī, and probably refers to the Golconda and Kollur mines. As regards Kaliṅga, diamond finds are recorded from the Mahanadi alluvium in the Sambalpur diastrict of Orissa, in the sands of the Koel river, an effluent of the Son, in the Palamau district, and at Hira-kund (literally diamond mine). Pauṇḍra is identified with Mahasthan in Bogra district of northern Bangladesh; it could be adjoining Assam also. None of these possibly ancient workings have been precisely indentified or dated so far.

v1.c25.s6.15

Pliny (AD 77) had referred to diamond as adamas (Historia Naturalis, B.37. 15), the hardest mineral in India with hexangular and hexahedral form. The Adamas river of Ptolomey or Ptolemy (AD 90-168) has been variously identified as Mahanadi or Brahmani river by various scholars. (Ball, 1880: 237 and 263) Ptolemy’s Kosa was probably South Kośala or Eastern Mālwā around the present Pānnā mines. We have quoted B.N. Mukherjee’s view in the previous chapter that this area was known during Ptolemy’s period as Ākarāvanti (Avanti having ākara of vajra or mine of diamond), when Kaniṣka I annexed the area from the Sātavāhanas.

v1.c25.s6.16

Although we have been unable to be more accurate about the diamond mines in ancient India up to AD 1200, the extent and magnitude of mining till that period has never been in doubt. Ferishtah, the Persian historian, wrote that Mohammad Ghori, one of the early invaders of India (1186), “had left at his death 500 muns (= 400 lbs.) of diamonds; all this enormous treasure he had amassed during the thirty-two years of his Indian sway” (quoted by Bauer, 1968: 153) There are reports of similar treasures of gems including diamond being usurped from the Hindu kings by Alauddin Khilji, Babar etc. indicating the activity of Indian diamond mines before AD 1200. Later reports by Tavarnier etc. merely prove that the mining of diamond continued in the medieval period. The Cuddapah group of mines on the Penner river such as the Condapetta diamond mine (Newbold, 1842) might have started production at a later stage of Indian history. Until the discovery of the Brazilian deposits in 1728, the supply of diamond of the whole world was derived almost entirely from the Indian sources.

v1.c25.s6.17

The literary references to the chalcedony group of gem-minerals such as agate, carnelian, onyx, sard, sardonyx and their uses in ancient India would be discussed in Vol. II chapter 7. Agate and carnelian were mined, processed and used even in the Pre-Harappan times. Yellowish varieties containing hydrated ferric oxide used to be dehydrated on heating and thus reddened to beautiful carnelian in India for centuries in an age-old practice.

v1.c25.s6.18

The best known deposits are found in the Rajpipla Hills, at Ratanpur, on the lower Narmadā river (vide fig. 17.4), “whence for more than 2000 years, the lapidaries at Broach have obtained their supplies of rough carnelian, agate etc.” (Bauer, 1968: 517) The mother amygdaloidal rocks of the Deccan plateau extend from Surat to Kathiawar. Ball reported the Ratanpur mine shafts to be 4 ft in diameter and about 30 ft deep. At the foot of each shaft, galleries 5 ft high and 4 ft wide branched off on all sides. These passages about 100 yards long often joined the galleries of other mines. Ball (1881: 507-13) provided a detailed extract of Campbell’s account of the mining and lapidaries at Ratanpur. The pre-modern mines in India reported by the British geologists of the nineteenth century are outside the scope of our review; but we are mentioning the agate-carnelian mines of Rajpipla because the scholars are unanimous about the great antiquity of these workings. Furthermore, Peyton (Paithan or Pratisthana) on the Godavari has been identified as Plithana of the *Periplus* (1st century AD) where agate and onyx used to be mined and sent to the factories at Broach for processing and export. (Ball, 1881: 505)

v1.c25.s6.19

Burnes provided an account of the salt mines of Punjab in 1832 (*Journal of Asiatic Society of Bengal*, Vol. 1, pp. 145-48, quoted by Chakarbarti, 1986: 195), but we do not know how ancient was this reported mine near Pindi Dadan Khan.

v1.c25.s6.20

Ball (1881: 483-90) described the network of Kalabagh mines, Bannu district, Panjab. This Salt-Range was stated to be (geologically) ‘the oldest known deposit of salt in the world’. *Ain-i-Akbari* refers to the deposit; the native tradition is that Akbar was informed of the existence of salt-mine in this region which might have been started earlier than his period. The exact antiquity is not known.

v1.c25.s6.21

In chapter 14, we have provided the composition of Taxilian and some other ancient glasses in which SiO₂, Al₂O₃, CaO/MgO and Na₂O/K₂O are the major constituents apart from other minor oxides. Brown and Dey (1955) have provided the account of the currently known deposits of sand, sandstone, quartz, quartzite (raw material for SiO₂), limestone, dolomite, dolomitic limestone (raw materials for CaO and MgO), feldspar (Na, K, Ca, alumino-silicate also used for making pottery, porcelain etc.), but which specific deposits were touched and exploited in the ancient period is not known.

v1.c25.s6.22

The major source of sodium has been the efflorescent alkaline *reh* deposits which ruin agriculture but aid industries. These natural deposits of *reh* salts — Na₂CO₃, NaHCO₃, NaCl, Na₂SO₄ — were used in the ancient times for making glass, providing glaze in the NBPW ware (*vide* chapter 11) etc. The *reh* salts occur as thin superficial incrustations, in flaky cemented patches, as a layer of white salt admixed with river alluvium soil. These alkaline soils widely occur in Moradabad, Meerut and several other districts of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar etc. and known as *reh*. These are known as *khari* in Bihar, *thur* and *kallar* in Punjab, *chavudu* in Andhra Pradesh and *chowhi chakke* in Mysore. As a matter of fact, the deposits are so widely occurring that most sites making glass in the Ancient India (*vide* fig. 17.5) could have been upon *reh*-like materials from the neighbouring deposits.

v1.c25.s6.23

Sajjī maṭṭi is the name of the crude mixture of sodium salts lixiviated out of *reh* and concentrated, and sold for making soap, glass, detergents etc. Typical compositions of *reh*, *sajjī maṭṭi* and salt lake bittern are given in Table 17.8.

v1.c25.s6.24

Table 17.8 Typical Compositions of *reh*, *sajjī maṭṭi* and Bittern

v1.c25.s6.25

| | Moradabad *reh* | Meerut *reh* | Kanpur *sajjī maṭṭi* | Sambhar bittern | Lonar lake incrustation fractions |
| Na₂CO₃ | 9.66 | 4.68 | 27.02 | 14.5 | 8.2-33.2 |
| NaHCO₃ | 8.55 | 3.96 | 4.28 | 9.1 | 6.3-24.4 |
| NaCl | 1.92 | 3.88 | — | 28.6 | 28.0 (av.) |
| Na₂SO₄ | 8.66 | 1.19 | 33.98 | 40.5 | 2.0 (av.) |
| | | | | K₂O | 4.3-10.3 |

v1.c25.s6.26

EARLY HISTORICAL SITES IN MANY OF WHICH GLASS OBJECTS HAVE BEEN FOUND

v1.c25.s6.27

Fig. 17.5: Archaeological and Early Historical Sites showing glass objects.

v1.c25.s6.28

Auden et al. (1942) estimated that the reh-infested districts of UP alone produced 0.5 m ton Na₂CO₃, 0.6 m ton NaHCO₃ and 0.3 m ton Na₂SO₄. Similar data from other states have been compiled by Brown and Dey (1955).

v1.c25.s6.29

The ancient India utilised not only some of the above-mentioned reserves but also the partially evaporated and fractionally crystallised residues of salt lake bitterns which contained, apart from the usual salt NaCl, considerable amounts sodium carbonate, bicarbonate and sulphate. Some typical data from Sambhar in Rajasthan and Lonar in Berar, compiled from Auden et al. (1942) and La Touche et al. (1912) are presented in Table 17. 8. The production of glasses in the chalcolithic sites near the lakes could have been made utilising the soda-rich bittern evaporites. The Lonar lake incrustation contains a substantial amount of K₂O of Potash. Caraka Saṃhitā and Suśruta Saṃhitā referred to sodium alkali as sarjikā kṣāra (sajji maṭṭi) and to potassium alkali as yavakṣāra (prepared from potash-rich plant ashes).

v1.c25.s6.30

Many secondary deposits (the end-products of diverse steps of bio-geological degradation), such as of ferrous sulphate, alum, saltpetre or potassium nitrate etc. were utilised in ancient India, but their precise locations had not been recorded with the meticulous care that was later exhibited by the British geologists of the nineteenth century. Similar remarks can be made about the iron ore exploitation in ancient India. These deposits are plentiful even today and ubiquitous all over India. In ancient India these must have been mined by open cast method as it is done today. But we do not have the C-14 dates regarding the specific sites from which iron ore was exploited in ancient India before AD 1200.

Linked texts (8)