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Most
of the famous large diamonds of the world have come from India, their
origin being usually traceable to a period between the thirteenth and
eighteenth centuries. Some of the best known of these are the Kohinoor,
Pitt, Orloff, Great Mogul, Florentine, and Sancy.
The
Kohinoor first appeared in history in the year 1304. It was at that
time mentioned as acquired by the Sultan Alaeddin from the Rajah of
Malwa, in whose family it had long been held as an heirloom. It was
later restored to the Rajah of Gwalior; but on the defeat of this
official, in 1526, by Humairen, emperor of Hindostan, the stone was
presented to the latter by some of the former's adherents. Sultan
Baber states that at this time the diamond was valued at " half the
daily expense of the whole world." The stone remained in the
possession of the Mogul dynasty until the invasion of India in 1739 by
Nadir Shah, the Persian conqueror. The reputed exclamation of the
latter when he first saw the stone, "Koh-i-Nur!" ("Mountain of Light!")
gave it the name by which it has since been known. As the reward of an
alliance the diamond was given by the son of Nadir to Ahmed Shah,
founder of the Durain Afghan empire, in 1751. A successor of the latter
sought to conceal the stone from a usurper by embedding it in the
plaster of his cell, but after lying hidden in this way for many years
it became exposed and was once more restored to the Afghan crown. An
Indian prince, Runjit Singh, later obtained the diamond by conquest and
brought it to Lahore where it remained until English rule was
established. In 1850 it was sent to England in charge of two officers.
It weighed at that time 186-1/16 carats. It had not a symmetrical
shape, its cutting being confined, after the usual manner of Indian
lapidaries, to fashioning rude facets on the surface. It also contained
two or three flaws. In order to remove these, and give it a symmetrical
shape, the stone was cut in London, in 1852, by Messrs. Coster, of
Amsterdam, to the form of a brilliant. About 80 carats were sacrificed
in this process, and the stone at present has a weight of 106 carats.
The quality of the Kohinoor is not the finest, it having a slight
grayish tinge; but on account of its romantic history it is one of the
most famous, if not the most famous, of diamonds.
The
diamond known as the "Regent" or "Pitt" was found in India in 1701 by a
slave, who to conceal it, cut his leg that he might put it in the
bandage thus made necessary. He thus escaped with it to the coast, and
offered the stone to an English skipper as payment for passage to a
free country. The latter on receiving the diamond threw the slave into
the sea. He then sold the gem to a dia-
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