Hindu Achievements in Exact Science: A Study in the History of Scientific Development c17: XI. Metallurgy and Chemical Arts

Hindu Achievements in Exact Science: A Study in the History of Scientific Development c17

Language: English

XI. Metallurgy and Chemical Arts

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INDIA was the greatest "industrial power" of antiquity. It was the manufactures of the Hindus, which, backed up by their commercial enterprise, served as standing advertisements of India in Egypt, Babylonia, Judæa, Persia, etc. To the Romans of the Imperial epoch and the Europeans of the Middle Ages, also, the Hindus were noted chiefly as a nation of industrial experts.

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Some of the arts⁵² for which the people of India have had traditional fame are those connected with (1) bleaching, (2) dyeing, (3) calico-printing, (4) tanning, (5) soap-making, (6) glass-making, (7) manufacture of steel, (8) gun-powder and fire-works, and (9) preparation of cements. All these imply a knowledge of industrial chemistry.

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1\. Patanjali, the founder of Hindu metallurgy, (second century B.C.) gave elaborate directions for many metallurgic and chemical processes, especially the preparation of metallic salts, alloys, amalgams, etc., and the extraction, purification, and assaying of metals.⁵⁹ 2. During the fourth century the Hindus could forge a bar of iron, says Fergusson, “larger than any that have been forged in Europe up to a very late date, and not frequently even now.” ⁴⁴

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3. Gun-powder “may have been introduced into China from India” about the fifth or sixth century a.d. (*Journal of the North China Branch of R. A. S.*, *New Series*, vi. 82).

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4. The secret of manufacturing the so-called Damascus blades was learned by the Saracens from the Persians, who had mastered it from the Hindus.⁵² In Persia, the Indian sword was proverbially the best sword, and the phrase *jawabee hind* (“Indian answer”) meant “a cut with the sword made of Indian steel.”

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5. During the sixth century⁵⁹ the Hindu chemists could prepare:

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(1) Fixed or coagulated mercury;
(2) A chemical powder, the inhalation of which would bring on sleep or stupor;
(3) A chemically prepared stick or wick for producing light without fire;
(4) A powder, which, like anæsthetic drugs or curare, paralyzes sensory and motor organs.

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6. The horticulturists of the same period were familiar with several mixtures and infusions, probably struck upon empirically, for supplying the requisite nitrogen compounds, phosphates, etc., to plants.

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7. The metallurgists of the same period were familiar with the processes of extraction, purification, “killing” (formation of oxides, chlorides, and oxy-chlorides), calcination, incineration, powdering, solution, distillation, precipitation, rinsing, drying, melting, casting, filing, etc. With the help of apparatus and reagents they subjected each of the known minerals to all these processes. Heat was applied in different measures for different ends.⁵⁹

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8. So early as the sixth century the mercurial operations alone were nineteen in number.

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Pliny, the Roman of the first century A.D., noticed the industrial position of the Hindús as paramount in the world. India maintained the same position even in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when the modern European nations began to come into intimate touch with her. This long-standing industrial hegemony of the Hindus was due to their capacity for harnessing the energies of Nature to minister to the well-being of man. They made several important discoveries in chemical technology. These may be generalized ⁵⁹ into three: