Distribution of Pearls and Pearl-shell. 87 



In India pearls were known and appreciated many 

 centuries before Christ. They are frequently mentioned 

 in Indian mythology, their discovery being attributed to 

 Krishna, the eighth avatar or incarnation of Vishnu, who 

 is said to have searched the ocean for these gems and 

 then carried them to India as a wedding gift to his 

 daughter Pandai'a. The Atharvaveda (at least 500 years 

 B.C.), alludes to an amulet made of pearls and pearl-shell 

 used for bestowing long life and prosperity upon young 

 Brahmanical disciples. ■'° The two great epics of ancient 

 India, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, also refer to 

 pearls, and the former speaks of a necklace of twenty- 

 seven of these gems, and refers to pearl drillers accom- 

 panying a great military expedition. Ancient Indian 

 deities are represented as being adorned with these gems, 

 and, according to Varahamihira, the Indian astronomer, 

 the statue of the Sun-god, Mithra, wore a crown upon his 

 head, and was decked with chain-work of pearls, and 

 earrings also of pearl. Pearls and diamonds served as 

 eyes for images of the gods ; they were also employed to 

 decorate the interior of Buddha's tomb, and shone 

 upon the beautiful box containing his sacred tooth. 

 Distinguished Indian women wore purple draperies orna- 

 mented with pearls, and on great public occasions their 

 arms were covered with them ; and they even wove them 

 into their hair.* Special esteem seems to have been ac- 

 corded to rose coloured pearls, for red pearls (JLohitamukti) 

 form one of the seven precious objects which it was incum- 

 bent to use in the adornment of Buddhistic reliquaries, 

 and to distribute at the building of a Dagopa." 



*° See translation by Maurice Bloomfield in " Hymns of the Atliarva- 

 veda," Oxford, 1897, p. 62. 



■" Von Hassling, op. cit., pp. 1-2 ; Streeter, op. cit., pp. 24-25 ; Kunz 

 and Stevenson, op. cit., pp. 3-4. 



*' Lovell, op. cit., p. 97 ; see also Yule's " Marco Polo," ii., p. 203. 



