Stones or Nocturnal Luminosity 55 



Stones of Nocturnal Luminosity. — We noticed that the diamond 

 and the traditions connected with it reached the Chinese chiefly from 

 the Hellenistic Orient. We should therefore be justified in expecting 

 also that the historical texts relative to Ta Ts'in and inserted in the 

 Chinese annals might contain references to this stone; but in Hirth's 

 classical work "China and the Roman Orient," where all these docu- 

 ments are carefully assembled and minutely studied, the diamond is 

 not even mentioned. 1 This, at first sight, is very striking; but it would 

 be permissible to think that the diamond is hidden there under a name 

 not yet recognized as such. In the first principal account of Ta Ts'in 

 embodied in the Annals of the Posterior Han Dynasty, 2 we read that 



and almost all bright and brisk, whereof no other reason can be given, but that they 

 are found at the bottom of a river amongst sand which is pure, and has no mixture, 

 or tincture of other earth, as in other places. These stones are not discovered till 

 after the waters which fall like huge torrents from the mountains, are all passed, and 

 men have much to do to attain them, since few persons go to traffic in this isle; and 

 forasmuch as the inhabitants do fall upon strangers who come ashore, unless it be by 

 a particular favor. Besides that, the Queen does rarely permit any to transport 

 them; and so soon as ever any one hath found one of them they are obliged to bring 

 it to her. Yet for all that they pass up and down, and now and then the Hollanders 

 buy them in Batavia. Some few are found there, but the largest do not exceed 

 five carats, although in the year 1648, there was one to be sold in Batavia of 22 carats. 

 I have made mention of the Queen of Borneo, and not of the King, because that the 

 isle is always commanded by a woman, for that people, who will have no prince but 

 what is legitimate, would not be otherwise assured of the birth of males, but can not 

 doubt of those of the females, who are necessarily of the blood royal on their mother's 

 side, she never marrying, yet having always the command." 



1 India's trade in diamonds with Ta Ts'in, already pointed out, is mentioned in 

 the chapter on India, inserted in the T'ang Annals (Ch. 221 a, p. 10 b). 



* Hou Han shu, Ch. 1 18, p. 4b. Both the night-shining jewel and the moonlight 

 pearl are mentioned together also in the Nestorian inscription of Si-ngan fu and in 

 the Chinese Manichean treatise (Chavannes and Pelliot, Traits manicheen, p. 68). 

 In the latter it is compassion that is likened to the "gem, bright like the moon, which 

 is the first among all jewels." The T'ung tien of Tu Yu (written from 766 to 801) 

 ascribes genuine pearls, night-shining and moon-bright gems, to the country of the 

 Pigmies north-west of Sogdiana (Tai p'ing yu Ian, Ch. 796, p. 7 b). In that fabulous 

 work Tung ming ki, which seems to go back to the middle of the sixth century (Cha- 

 vannes and Pelliot, /. c, p. 145), the Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty is said 

 to have obtained in 102 b.c. a white gem (4>EJ^; the word chu means not only 

 "pearl, bead," but also "gems generally"), which the Emperor wrapped up in a 

 piece of brocade. It was as if it reflected the light of the moon, whence it was styled 

 "moon-reflecting gem" (chao yue chu; see P'ei win yiin fu, Ch. 7A, p. 107). The 

 San Ts'in ki, a book of the fifth century, has on record that in the tumulus of the 

 Emperor Ts'in Shi pearls shining at night (ye kuang chu) formed a palace of the sun 

 and moon, and that moonlight pearls (ming yiie chu) suspended in the grave emitted 

 light by day and night (Tu shu tsi ch'&ng, chapter on pearls, ki shi, I, p. 3b). The 

 word p'i used in the term ye kuang p'i, at first sight, is striking, as it refers to a per- 

 forated circular jade disk, such as occurs in ancient China (see Jade, p. 154), but does 

 not occur in the Hellenistic Orient. It is therefore probable that the term already 

 pre-existed in China, and was merely transferred to a jewel of the Roman Orient 



