HISTORICAL AND REMARKABLE DIAMONDS. 213
" Mound of Light," as the name implies. Tradition assigns it
an exceedingly great antiquity, having been found in the
Godavery river, Southern India, between four thousand and
five thousand years ago, previous to the Indian war celebrated
in the great epic, the Mahabharata, and was worn by one of the
chiefs who fell in battle on the occasion. Consequently, it is
the oldest known diamond in the world.
It came into possession of the family of one of the ancient
native princes, the Rajah of Malwar, and was transmitted to
his successors through many generations, until it passed into
the hands of the Mohammedan conquerors of India, at the
beginning of the fourteenth century. It constituted one of
the most valuable gems of the imperial treasury of Delhi, until
it was carried off by Nadir Shah, the Persian conqueror, in
1739. After the assassination of Nadir, this gem became the
property of the Afghan monarchs, and from them was transferred to Runjeet Singh ; the Sikh hero of the Punjaub, who
had it set in a bracelet, and just before his death, in 1839, ne
was advised to devote it to Juggernaut, but the act was not
consummated, and it was left among his other treasures.
The story is told that Nadir Shah possessed himself of the
diamond by artifice. He believed that it was concealed in the
turban of the dethroned emperor, since it could not be found in
the treasury at Delhi, and on the pretext of restoring the
conquered ruler to his dominions, which the wily Persian
made the occasion of a grand display, he artfully proposed, as
a mark of friendship, to exchange turbans with his imperial
guest, an act of courtesy the prisoner did not deem it politic
to refuse, and the famous diamond came into the hands of the
conqueror, who, oh beholding it, exclaimed, " Koh-i-Nûr ! "
On the fall of Nadir Shah's extensive empire, Ahmed Shah,
the Afghan chief who established a new dynasty, became the
