57 



Gujarat ami Kaihiaivar. 



Mr. Bruce l^^oote's labours prove that the custom of 

 using chank bangles was widely spread and that chank- 

 bangle factories were numerous in these two provinces 

 in ancient times. 



The finds which he records are as follows : — 



/// Kathiaivar : — 



{a) Damnagar, Amreli Prant. In the fields (pre- 

 sumably upon the surface) north of the camping tope at 

 this town a great number of chank bangles in a fragment- 

 ary condition were found and of these 41 pieces are 

 represented in the Museum collection. Three working 

 fragments were also found at the same place, together 

 with a couple of cowries, and a Trochus shell ground 

 upon three sides. Associated were such neoliths as a 

 basalt corncrusher, a bloodstone hammer and chert and 

 agate cores. 



{h) Babapur. At this village situated 13 miles 

 westward of Amreli, the alluvium of the left bank of the 

 Shitranji river yielded a large and important series of 

 neolithic chert flakes, scrapers, slingstones, and cores in 

 association with 13 fragments of finished chank bangles, 

 together with two working fragments and part of the 

 columella of a chank. Several of the flint flakes are 

 worked upon one or both edges, and one of the bangle 

 fragments exhibits a chaste design executed with con- 

 siderable delicacy (pi. IV, fig. 3615-1). The other 

 bangles are of plain and crude design. 



(c) Ambavalli. Seventy-one fragments of broken 

 bangles from an old site at this place are represented in 

 the Museum collection (Nos. 3622-1 to 65 and 81 to 89). 

 Of these the greater number are ornamented by pattern 

 grooving and many show an elaboration of design as great 

 as those now manufactured in Bengal. The designs in 

 many instances are precisely the same as those in vogue 

 to-day. Seventeen of the finest examples are shown on 

 plate V, borrowed from the Foote catalogue. 



Associated with these bangle fragments were numer- 

 ous portions of sawn sections of chank shells, consti- 

 tuting the rough working material required by the bangle 

 carver; ^,2, fragments are shown (Nos. 3622-63 to 65 and 

 90 to 1 19). 



