64 



to flourish at the present day, should be of modern 

 growth. 



With regard to the thu'd known seat of the industry 

 in ancient times, that which flourished in the early 

 centuries of the Christian era in the Tinnevelly district, 

 its geographical location in the coastal section of the 

 Pandyan kingdom made it the natural centre and home 

 of a great chank-cutting industry. Its Pandyan sove- 

 reigns were from time immemorial overlords of the Pearl 

 and Chank Fisheries of the Gulf of Mannar and Palk Bay, 

 the most important source of supply of the raw material 

 then and now, and it is a curious vagary of trade that the 

 present seat of the industry should be situated 1,500 

 miles from the scene of the fishery. 



From the fact that among a few widely separated 

 castes, sub-castes and tribes of the extreme south of 

 India, including among others the Kotas of the Nilgiri 

 Hills and certain sections of the Vellalans and Idaiyans 

 in the inland Coimbatore district, the custom prevails of 

 wearing chank bangles for ceremonial reasons, we may 

 also reasonably infer the former wider prevalence of 

 the custom. Indeed it is probable that the custom was 

 at one time prevalent throughout a large section of 

 Southern India. 



Kathiawar and adjacent Gujarat are also both mari- 

 time provinces and this geographical situation is the key 

 to the location of the chank-bangle industry in those pro- 

 vinces in early times ; the coast of Kathiawar is the only 

 considerable source of chank shells apart from the Gulf 

 of Mannar and Palk Bay. No chank-cutting is now 

 done either in Kathiawar or Gujarat; the women there 

 have abandoned their former habit of wearino- chank 

 bangles and all the shells fished in this locality are 

 exported from Bombay to Bengal where they are known 

 in trade as " Surti " shells, Surat having been the port of 

 shipment prior to the rise of Bombay. 



Why the Southern Deccan should once have been the 

 home of a shell-cutting industry is not so easy of explan- 

 ation, seeing that it is situated in the heart of the 

 country and distant from 400 to 500 miles from the 

 nearest sources of supply (Rameswaram and the Tanjore 

 coast). Possibly the location of this trade in the Deccan 

 was due to the superior skill as craftsmen of the people 

 in these districts inherited from stone-using ancestors 



