398 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



distinctly marked 1069, i.e. a.d. 1658-59, the year of Aurangzeb's- 

 accession, when he deposed his father. 



Lady Carew's ruby has the figures 107, which may be taken to 

 indicate 1070, or a.b. 1659-60 the year, or the year following, of 

 Aurangzeb's formal proclamation.^ 



i^ow this matter is not altogether a small or insignificant one, 

 because it is known that Shah Jahan, when dethroned by his son, 

 retained with him, in his prison, a large number of jewels which did 

 not come into Aurangzeb's possession till 1666, when, on the death of 

 Shah Jahan, they were handed to him in a gold basin by his sister, 

 Jahanara Begum, who accompanied the transfer by some rather uncom- 

 plimentary remarks on his past proceedings. 



The Great Mogul diamond, or Koh-i-nur, and the other jewels 

 described by Tavernier, were, of course, not among these last, and 

 one certainly, and the other of these rubies probably, came into 

 Aurangzeb's hands, at or about the time of his accession, and were 

 soon afterwards engraved. 



This is all I have been, as yet, able to deduce from these dates, and 

 names " graven in stone." Had all the famous stones been similarly 

 engraved, there would have been less room for discussion as to their 

 antecedents, than there now is. On the other, hand the process of 

 engraving on the prominent faces of large stones cannot but have 

 depreciated their values to a very considerable degree. Be this as it 

 may, Jahangir's prophecy, quoted on a previous page, has in a measure 

 come true, and it may he hoped that hereafter no stone still bearing 

 these great names, will ever, as some have been in the past, be re-cut,. 

 and their dates obliterated. 



[Note, &c. 



1 Aurungzeb's proclamation. The second year of the reign commenced on the 

 4th, Eamazan, 1069, a.h. The Emperor's name and titles were proclaimed in the 

 pulpit as Abu-1 Muzaffar Miihiu-d din Muhammad Aurangzeb Bahadur' Alamgir 

 Badshah-i Ghazi. In former reigns one of the sides of the coins had been adorned 

 with the words of the creeds and the names of the first four Khalifs ; but as coins 

 pass into many iin-\vorthy places, and fall under the feet of infidels, it was ordered 

 that the superscription should be changed (for certain couplets containing the 

 Emperor's name). " Khafi Khan, Muntakbabu-1-Lubab,'' vol. ii., p. 77 : see 

 "EUiot," vol. vii. p. 241. 



