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Ch. 35: The Nassak Diamond, Mahratta Power

Ch. 34: The Chapada Diamond, Peculiarities of Brazilian Stones Page of 312 Ch. 35: The Nassak Diamond, Mahratta Power Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
XXXV.
THE NASSAK.
Under the Mahratta Power—" Gifts of the gods "—A Present to the East India Company — Reminiscences of a Royal Birthday—Re-cut by Order of the Marquis of Westminster.
HE town of Nassak, variously written Nassac, Nassik, Nasik, Nessuck, &c, lies on the Upper Godavery, 95 miles by rail north-east of Bombay. In the neighbourhood are some famous cave-temples, and in the days of the Mahratta ascendancy, this town was a noted place of pilgrimage, annually resorted to by thousands of devotees. The offerings of these worshippers of Shiva, the presiding genius of the district, caused here, as elsewhere, throughout the peninsula, a gradual accumulation of vast treasures in the local shrines. While the Mahratta power flourished, these treasures were respected, but when they fell upon evil days, the Peishwas, nominal heads of the great confederacy, helped themselves freely to the "gifts of the gods," thereby acquiring the means to carry on their incessant wars against rival chiefs, and finally against the all-absorbing " Company Bahadur." When Bajerow, the last independent Peishwa, surrendered to the British in the last Mah­ratta war of 1818, his baggage became the "loot"
Ch. 34: The Chapada Diamond, Peculiarities of Brazilian Stones Page of 312 Ch. 35: The Nassak Diamond, Mahratta Power
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