Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v2.c42.s2.4

v2.c42.s2.4

The food habits of some of the princely heroes are almost primitive: they cook their own meat-broths. They dress simply in cotton cloth and hardly wear decorative shoes. Sugar, quite common in India by 400 BC, is nowhere on the scene in the epic. The complete absence of coins and money economy (niṣka is more of a gold ornament than a piece of coin) proves the distant origins of the epic. Conch-shell bangles were of Harappan tradition and pearls were mentioned in the Vedas. Glass (kāca) and quartz crystal (kācamaṇi) were rarely mentioned.