GLASS AND GLASSWARE 



GLASS 



AND GLASSWARE 



iii -nil of very complex and variable composition occurring in the granitic 52^fJ(. 

 ami iii.'tatiiorjibic rocks of mont countries. It in generally blu< !., uli"n 



ftorl; rod varieties (rubulllte), dark-blue (Indicoliite) and white (achroite) 



ooonr. The rod variety is commonest in India, good specimens being of a 



ntuson colour. White specimens have occasionally been found among 



t In' black i the Shan States, and green tourmaline has been mentioned 



nrring in the Hazaribagh district of Bengal and in granite dykes in the bed 



of tin- Kauveri, Seringapatam. Holland states that various attempts have been 



to work the rod variety which occurs in the Ruby district of Upper Burma. 



In ivs .,,. outturn worth 359 was reported, in 1900 worth 1.240, an<l in 



I !'<>;{. i'l'.Mi, but returns for 1898 and 1902 are not available. [Cf. Mill. urn. I.e. i.. 



-..' ; Introd. Chem. and Phy. Study Ind. Min., 1859, 82 ; Min. Rev., 1896, 42; 



40; Scott, Oaz. Upper. Burma and Shan States, 1900, ii., pt. i., 227-30; 



I'.iol, pt. ii., 392.] 



GLASS AND GLASSWARE. Glass is known in India by 

 tin- vernacular names of kanch, kunnadi, addannu, shishah, kizaz. It is 

 u mixture of silicate of potassium or sodium, or of both, with one or more 

 silicates insoluble in water, such as those of the alkaline earths, aluminium, 

 manganese, iron or lead. The mixture is effected by fusion. 



History. Stein (Ancient Khotan, 1907, 373), in discussing fragments of glass 

 pic kd up at Niya (3rd century), observes, " Glass was until the middle of the fifth 

 cent ury of our era known in China only as an import from Ta-Ch'in, the Far West 

 ( Hirth, China and the Roman Orient, 228 et seq.), and it appears very improbable 

 that the introduction of glass manufacture could have been delayed so long, if 

 the making of glass hod been an art practised in Eastern Turkestan when the 

 latter was under Chinese control during earlier centuries. It is significant that, 

 according to the Pei shih, the first makers of glass in China were traders from the 

 country of the Great Yulk-chih, i.e. from the Old Indo-Scythian dominion, for 

 whom the land route through Khotan was a more likely line of communication 

 than the sea route." 



In India glass is little employed for the purposes it is ordinarily used in other 

 countries (windows, bottles, etc.), and the process of manufacture, as carried on 

 by the Natives, is accordingly very crude and unscientific. The chief materials 

 employed are carbonate of soda in its crude condition, called reh, and the impure 

 sands of the rivers with certain special earths, etc. The ordinary Native glass is 

 e, coarse, impure, coloured or dirty mass, full of flaws and air bubbles, and suitable 

 only for the manufacture of beads, coarse bangles and other minor articles. White 

 glass is sometimes made (or rather re-made) by melting broken glass or glassware 

 of European manufacture. 



Indian Production. The chief centres of the glass industry to-day are the 

 Lahore, Karnal, Jhelam and Hoshiarpur districts of the Panjab ; the Bijnor, 

 Lucknow and Saharanpur districts, United Provinces ; Ahmednagar, Kaira. 

 and Baroda, Bombay ; Seoni, Central Provinces ; Patna, Bengal ; lastly the 

 State of Jaipur and the North Arcot district, Madras. The chief articles 

 manufactured are bangles (churis), beads, crude globes, silvered with mercury 

 or tinfoil, coarse toys, small bottles, lamp chimneys, etc. The only glassware 

 in India with any pretension to art is that produced at Patna. The articles 

 are generally coloured and the shapes very elegant but exceedingly fragile. 

 The industry is said to be dying out for want of demand. Special mention may 

 be made of the glass mosaics seen in the palaces of some parts of Rajputana, 

 the Panjab and Burma. It was to meet this demand that the industry of 

 blowing glass globes, silvered inside, sprang into existence. The globes are 

 broken up into fragments of certain sizes, then set in cement (or in Burma 

 in laoquer), and in that way constitute the chief decorative feature of shiah 

 mahals (looking-glass palaces). The smaller fragments of silvered glass am 

 a I -i. worked up into the embroidered phulkari cloths of the Panjab. There is 

 in addition the true mosaic art where coloured glass elaborates a pattern, as 

 seen in the palaces of Udaipur. 



The influences that operate against the establishment in Ind : a of glass works 

 on a commercial scale are the cheapness of the imported Western products, the 

 want (if enterprise on the part of capitalists, and the unfavourable climatic con- 

 ditions. Rooontly several praiseworthy efforts to extend the manufacture of 



563 



D.E.P., 

 iii., 503-6. 

 Glass. 



K.irly 

 Knowledge. 



Indian Glass. 



Bangles. 



Beads. 



Patna 



Glass Works. 



