1876.] 
The Diamond in India, 
353 
Mogul,” mentioned by Tavernier, is probably that now 
called Darya-i-nur : it weighs 279 9-16 carats, and graces the 
treasury of the Shah. The nearest approach to “ The 
Nizam ” is the Mattan or Laudah diamond, of 376 carats. 
Experts agree to ignore the Maganza, whose 1680 carats 
are calculated to be worth £5,644,800 : the stone is kept 
with so much mystery that it is suspedted to be a white 
topaz. 
Diamonds have been found in the Ganges Valley. 
They are still washed as far north as Sambalpur and the 
Majnodi, an influent of the Mahanadi ; on the Upper Nar- 
bada (Nerbudda), on the line of the Godaveri and on the 
course of the Krishna. The extreme points would range 
between Masulipatam and the Ganges Valley ; the more 
limited area gives a depth from north to south of some 5 0 
( = 300 diredt geographical miles), beginning north from the 
Central Provinces and south from the Western Ghats, a 
breadth averaging about the same extent, and a superficies 
of 90,000 miles. A considerable part of this vast space is 
almost unexplored. 
The history of the diamond in India begins with the 
Mahabharata (b.c. 2100). The Koh-i-nur is supposed to have 
belonged to King Vikramaditya (b.c. 56) and to a succession 
of Moslem Princes (a.d. 1306) till it fell into the hands of 
the Christians. At what period India invented the cutting 
of the stone we are as yet unable to find out ; the more 
civilised Greeks and Romans ignored, it is suspedted, the 
steel wheel. The Indian diamond was first made famous 
in Europe by the French jeweller, Jean Baptiste Tavernier 
(born 1605, died 1689), who made six journeys to the Penin- 
sula as a purchaser of what he calls the Iri (hira). 
Tavernier’s travels are especially interesting to diamond- 
diggers. He began with “ Raulconda,” in the Carnatic, 
some five days’ journey south of Golconda, and eight or nine 
marches from Vizapore {ho die Bijapur). In 1665 the dig- 
gings were some two hundred years old, and they still 
employed 60,000 hands. The traveller’s description of the 
sandy earth, full of rocks, and “covered with coppice wood, 
nearly similar to the environs of Fontainbleau,” is appli- 
cable to the Nizam’s country about Haydarabad. The 
diamond veins ranged from half an inch to an inch in thick- 
ness, and the gangue was hooked out with iron rods. Some 
of the stones were valued at 2000, and some even at 16,000 
crowns ; the steel wheel was used for cutting. Tavernier 
then passed on to the Ganee diggings, which the Persians 
call Coulour {hod. Burkalun), also belonging to the King 
VOL. vi. (n.s.) 2 K 
