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Adamas, Diamond

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ADAMAS.
27
tion of the true Diamond into Greece, sharp fragments of Corundum obtained from Naxos served the same purpose: the name Adamas was then doubtless confined to the blue and grey Sapphires found in Cyprus, or to the opaquer crystals of Corundum discovered in the emery-mines. Such a stone reduced to sharp fragments would serve to cut into and excise the Quartz gems, Sards, Agates, Jaspers, then in request as signets, with almost as much facility as the Diamond itself. In fact, the amorphous Corundum used from time immemorial by the Indian lapidaries for cutting the hardest gems was known when introduced into the European atelier, some ninety years ago, by the name of Adamantine Spar. That some such mineral must then have repre­sented the Adamas is a necessary consequence of the established fact that works apparently executed entirely by the Diamond-point and others with but little assistance from the drill, belong for the most part to the archaic period of Greek art, some ages before the true Diamond could have found its way thither from India. Similarly within the last few years the Diamond-dust has been superseded in Paris by the Carbonado, a black substance of the same chemical nature, but found in Brazil much more abundantly, the masses attaining to 1000 carats in weight. This, besides being employed in powder, is fashioned, says Barbot, into a kind of graver (burin) designed to act most efficaciously upon the hardest gems.
It was not before 1475 that the art of cutting the Diamond into a regular form so as to bring out all its lustre was invented by Louis de Berghem (or Berquem), although Laborde1 has discovered mention of the " tailleurs de Diamants," and one Herman designated a skilful workman, established in Paris in 1407, and also three " diamant-slipers " at Bruges in 1465. But the very designation of these last shows that their profession extended no further than the polishing the stone, or removing the greenish film that veils its transparency, and this might be effected by emery-powder alone by a very tedious though effectual process. L. de Berghem tried his newly-invented art upon three large
Adamas, Diamond Page of 453 Adamas, Diamond
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