A Concise History of Science in India c9.s8.6

c9.s8.6

The word ‘*bāṇa*’ in the sense of a rocket finds a place in the Sanskrit work of Pratāparudradeva mentioned above. The authorship of the important works on pyrotechnics in Tamil is generally attributed to one Bogar or Boganathar who is among the eighteen Siddhas of Tamilnadu and who, according to the local tradition, had contacts with China. The Tamil works on pyrotechnics describe three principal types of fireworks, viz. those which pierce through air (rockets), those which produce sparks of coloured fire, and those which blaze with various colours and end with explosions. Saltpetre, sulphur, charcoal, iron powder, bamboo tubes and flats, mercury, cinnabar, copper salts, camphor, rice paste, arsenic substances, pulp of castor seeds and wicks are among the important ingredients mentioned in these works for the preparation of different fireworks. Several formulae, 98 in number, for the manufacture of some 20 types of fireworks, are found in considerable detail in these Tamil sources. Of particular significance is the fact that the metal dusts (of copper, iron or steel, lead, brass and zinc) are used for producing sparklings of different colours. The date of the works attributed to Bogar is uncertain. On the basis of some internal evidence found in the text, its probable date is twelfth to thirteenth centuries A.D.