Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v2.c37.6

v2.c37.6

The writings on minerals and metals in the Sanskrit literature are surprisingly scanty and scattered. These have been often peripheral to other topics of interest such as philosophy, theology, poetry and history as in the Vedic literatures, and later grammar, political economy, prognostication, astrology, medicine and alchemy, etc. Fortunately, the writers and compilers of the above topics had some interest in gems, non-gem minerals, metals, alloys, etc. and thus we have been benefited from their treatises.