III.-THE TUTICORIN CHANK 

 FISHERY. 



The sacred chank or sankh is the shell of the gastropod 

 mollusc T'urhinella rajm, of which a full-grown specimen is 

 represented on plate II, and is, like the pearl oyster and the 

 edible trepang {Holothuria marmorata) a commercial product 

 of the Gulf of Manaar. 



The chank which one sees suspended on the forehead 

 and round the necks of bullocks in Madras is not only used 

 by Hindus for offering libations and as a musical instru- 

 ment in temples, but is also cut into armlets, bracelets, and 

 other ornaments, and writing in the sixteenth century 

 Garcia says ^ : — 



" And this chanco is a ware for the Bengal trade, and formerly 



produced more profit than now and there was formerly 



a custom in Bengal that no virgin in honour and esteem could 

 be corrupted unless it were by placing bracelets of chanco on 

 her arms ; but since the Patans came in, this usage has more or 

 less ceased, and so the chanco is rated lower now." 



The chank appears as a symbol on some of the coins of 

 the Chalukyan and Pdndyan empires, and on the modern 

 coins of the Ed] as of Travancore. 



The chank fishery is conducted from Tuticorin, and the 

 shells are found in the vicinity of the pearl banks, in about 

 7 to 10 fathoms,^ either buried in the sand, lying on the sea 

 bottom, or in sandy crevices between blocks of coral rock. 

 The fishery goes on during the north-east monsoon from 

 October to May, and is worked by native divers, who, put- 

 ting their foot on a stone to which a long rope is attached, 

 are let down to the bottom, carrying a net round the waist, 

 in which they place the chanks as they collect them. The 

 shells of the chank are scattered about, and not aggregated 

 together in clusters like those of the pearl oyster, so that the 



' Vide Yule and Burnell Eohson Johson, 1886. 



* For a discussion of the chank as an enemy of the pearl oyster, vide 

 Mr. H. S. Thomas' Report on Fearl Fisheries and Chank Fisheries] 1884. 



