6 The Diamond 



Asia and China on the other hand. Nevertheless the ideas conceived 

 by the Chinese regarding the diamond do not coincide with those enter- 

 tained in India, but harmonize with those which we find expounded in 

 classical literature. This fact is due to the direct importation of dia- 

 monds from the Hellenistic Orient to China; but it has been entirely 

 unknown heretofore, and this is another reason which will justify this 

 investigation now made for the first time. Its significance lies not only 

 in the field of Chinese research, but in that of classical archaeology as 

 well. The copious and reliable accounts of Chinese authors advance our 

 knowledge of the subject to a considerable degree beyond the point 

 where the classical writers leave us, and elucidate several problems as 

 yet unsettled. It will be seen on the pages to follow that the use of 

 the diamond-point in the ancient world, doubted or disowned by many 

 scholars, now becomes a securely-established fact, and also that the 

 acquaintance of the ancients with the true diamond rises from the 

 sphere of sceptical speculation into a certain and permanent fact. 

 Likewise the much-ventilated question as to whether the ancients 

 employed diamond-dust, and cut and polished the diamond, will be 

 presented in a new light. 



Legend of the Diamond Valley. — The Liang se kung ki, 1 one of 

 the most curious books of Chinese literature, contains the following 

 account: "In the period T'ien-lden (502-520) of the Liang dynasty, 



Germans in 1907, as the diamonds proved to be of little value for gems, while answer- 

 ing well for industrial purposes (Engineering and Mining Journal, Vol. LXXXIV, 

 1907, p. 1 159). An anonymous writer in Mines and Minerals (Vol. XXIII, 1903, 

 p. 552) reports as follows on Chinese diamond-digging: "The Chinese procure the 

 diamonds by the following method: After the summer rains which, according to 

 them, produce diamonds on the surface of the soil, whence the uselessness of digging 

 to find them, they walk back and forth over the sand of the torrents. The fragments 

 of diamonds, on account of their sharp points and edges, penetrate the rye straw of 

 their sabots to the exclusion of other gravel. When they think there is a sufficient 

 quantity they make a pile of the sabots and burn them. The ashes are afterwards 

 passed through a sieve to separate the diamonds. Those which we saw were small, 

 varying from the size of a grain of millet to that of a hemp seed. They are generally 

 of a light-yellow color like those of the Cape, though there are some perfectly white. 

 When they find them of sufficient size they break them, as they told us, in order to 

 make drill points, for, not knowing how to cut them, the Chinese in general do not 

 consider them as precious stones. They prefer the jade, the amethyst, the carnelian, 

 and the agate. Only the rich Chinese of the ports and of Peking have bought cut 

 diamonds, imported from India or Europe, to ornament their hats or their rings, 

 since the Dutch first brought them into China in the sixteenth century. The 

 Shan-tung collectors sell them throughout China, and their trade is of considerable 

 importance." The exact date of this modern diamond-digging is not known to me, 

 but it seems not to be earlier than the latter part of the nineteenth century. I can 

 find no reference to it in Chinese literature. 



1 Or Liang se kung tse ki (see Bretschneider, Bot. Sin., pt. 1, No. 451), that is, 

 Memoirs of the Four Worthies or Lords of the Liang Dynasty (502-556), who were 



