7^ 



" year from the Gulf of Mannar. In some years the value 

 "of the rough shells, as imported into Madras and 

 " Calcutta reaches a value of £10,000 or <£i5,ooo." I 

 have been unable to check the accuracy of these figures, 

 the present day production averaging not more than 

 2,500,000 but from the considerably greater revenue 

 derived by the Indian Government from the chank 

 fisheries off the Tinnevelly and Tanjore coasts during the 

 first half of last century (vu^e Appendix) the estimate 

 probably gives an accurate statement of the value ot 

 the fisheries 50 to 100 years ago. 



Overfishing in certain localities, decrease in the 

 numbers of the diving community and lessened demand 

 for chank bangles are the chief causes of a decline that 

 dates back beyond the assumption of the royal monopoly 

 of chank fishing by the Madras Government in the early 

 years of the nineteenth century. Garcia da Orta has 

 already been cited (p. 67) for the statement that in the 

 sixteenth century the chank trade with Bengal 

 " formerly produced more profit than now " his explana- 

 tion of the decline being the lower rates given in his day 

 owino- to the custom of wearino- chank banoles in Benoal 

 having " more or less ceased since the Pathans (Muham- 

 madans) came in." 



In the second half of the seventeenth century Tavernier 

 visited Dacca and records that more than 2,000 persons 

 were enoa^ed in the chank-banole trade in Dacca and 

 Pabna, " all that is produced by them being exported 

 to the kingdoms of Bhutan, Assam, Siam, and other 

 countries to the north and east of the territories of the 

 Great Mogul" (p. 267, Vol. II, English Translation, 

 London iScSq). He further mentions the visits of Bhutan 

 merchants to Dacca whence they took home for sale 

 " bracelets of sea-shells, with numerous round and square 

 pieces of the size of our 15 Sol coins." Elsewhere 

 [/oc. cit. p. 285) he characterized this trade as " large." 



Besides the trade in chank bracelets Tavernier {loc. 

 cit. p. 267) states that "all the people of the north, men, 

 women, girls and boys suspend small pieces of the same 

 shell both round and square from their hair and ears," 

 He also refers to a custom which prescribed that when 

 a man dies '' all his relatives and friends should come to 



