Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c23.s5.t1: Tendukaira
Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c23.s5.t1
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Tendukaira
c23.s5.t1.1
The Tendukaira mines are situated in a more westwardly position of the same valley, as those of Jabalpur, and are about one mile and a half distant from the village Tendukaira; they are near a low range of hills composed of *stratified quartz rock* which evidently contains felspar, and this rock is the gangue (No.1) of the ore; at times it assumes the character of *hornstone*, and when contiguous to the ore, it is penetrated by numerous slender veins, which although filled with the oxide of iron are very different from ordinary dendritic appearances, as they are always in shoots, intersecting each other, and never arborescent, and it seems quite impossible that they could have been produced by infiltration.
c23.s5.t1.2
The ore is never found near the surface as at *Jabalpur* but always about 30 feet below it, and in large masses, or beds, in cavities between the strata of the rock, which in some cases seems to have sustained violence; it is the brown *hydro-oxide*, both fibrous, and compact; but the former is by far the most prevailing; its general character, and appearance is opaque, and earthy, but when it has a metallic lustre, its fibres are beautifully fine, and constantly radiated; its most common form is irregular concentric lamellar, the lamellae of which are separated by a different colour, usually yellow, or yellowish brown; it is sometimes, though very rarely, crystallised, sometimes also it is mamillary and *botryoidal* but I have not met with any other imitative form; it contains manganese and silex, but sulphur is its principal vitiating constituent; its produce will be shown hereafter; but here it may be observed, that it yields most excellent malleable iron, fit for all uses, and also steel at nearly the same price as iron; there are five distinguishing names for it, which I shall give in the terms used by the native miners annexing thereto—their European synonyms: Gulkoo (No.2) includes all the waterworn pebbles which are embedded in diluvial gravel between the alluvium and the rock, under which the ore lies; it is a mixed and bad kind of ore.
c23.s5.t1.3
*Surma* (No.4) is distinguished by its red appearance and is usually found mixed with the above, it perhaps contains arsenic and is always carefully picked out, and thrown away; *Peera* (No.3) or yellow ore, is the yellowish brown variety—always intermixed with the other kinds, and marking by its difference of colour their concentric lamellar form, it rarely occurs separate, its streak is yellow.
c23.s5.t1.4
*Kala* (No.5) or black ore, is the compact earthy brown oxide, always dark coloured, generally approaching to black, sometimes but very rarely metallic (No.6) and crystallised (No.7), its streak is brown, and it is a very good kind of ore; *Devi Sahi* (No.8) or variegated, is the concentric lamellar variety (No.10 and 11) streaked with the yellow oxide; it has a fibrous tendency though opaque, but sometimes it is metallic as *Hemate* (No.9), and in this case its fibres are extremely fine, and of a silky lustre, its streak is yellowish brown and it is reckoned the best kind of ore, producing most abundantly, good malleable iron, and also tolerably good steel.