THE BOOK OF DIAMONDS
Later
Roman authors mentioned various rivers in India as yielding the Adamas
among the sands. The name Ad-amas became corrupted into the forms
adamant, diamant, and diamond. The same word was also applied to
lode-stone.
The
Bible makes few references to diamonds. The third stone of the second
row in the Jewish High Priest's breastplate, according to Biblical
translation, was a diamond, and in common with the others had the name
of a tribe of Israel engraved upon it. Some Hebrew schools think the
name of this stone was a diamond and others think it stood for agate.
It is possible that the diamond was intended though the one used may
have been another, but similar stone, as the ancients undoubtedly
confused different colorless transparent stones with the diamond. The
supposed diamond might have been white zircon, topaz or rock crystal.
If the stone was really diamond, the art of engraving diamonds must be
one of those ancient arts which were later lost, for conclusive
evidence does not exist of engraved diamonds earlier than the sixteenth
century.
We
find the most important enumeration of the precious stones known to the
ancient Hebrews in Exodus XXVIII, 17-20. This catalog is repeated in
the book, Chapter XXXIX, 10-13. The same list is found, with the
exception of three precious stones, the gems worn by the high priest on
his breastplate, in the citation of royal ornaments worn by the King of
Tyre, Ezekiel XXVIII, 13.
The diamond mentioned in Exodus is also mentioned by prophets, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Many scholars, however,
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