It is clear that this hen's egg diamond could not be the fame as Sultan Babar's, because the former was taken at Vijayanagar in A.D. 1565, whereas Sultan Babar's was received by his son Humayun at Agra in 1526, and could not have been, forty years later, in the possession of the Hindu king of the south.[651]
Dr. Ball has shown that probably the KOH-I-NUR is identical with the "Mogul's diamond." Was, then, this "hen's egg" diamond the same? Probably not. If we had been told that the "hen's egg," when found in the sack of Vijayanagar, had been cut, the proof CONTRA would be conclusive, since the KOH-I-NUR was certainly uncut in A.D. 1656 or 1657. But there is no information available on this point.
The "hen's egg" was apparently taken by the Adil Shah to Bijapur in 1565, and it is not likely to have found its way, still in an uncut state, into the possession of Mir Jumla in 1656.
The KOH-I-NUR was found at Kollur on the river Krishna, probably in A.D. 1656. Mir Jumla farmed the mines at that time, and presented it uncut to the emperor, Shah Jahan. It is said to have weighed 756 English carats (Ball, ii. 444). It was entrusted to a Venetian named Hortensio Borgio, and was so damaged and wasted in his hands that, when seen by Tavernier in Aurangzib's treasury in 1665, it weighed not more than 268 1/2 English carats. In 1739 Nadir Shah sacked Delhi and carried the stone away with him to Persia, conferring on it its present immortal name the "Mountain of Light." On his murder in 1747 it passed into the hands of his grandson, Shah Rukh. Four years later Shah Rukh gave it to Ahmad Shah Durani of Kabul, and by him it was bequeathed to his son Taimur. In 1793 it passed by descent to his son Shah Zaman, who was blinded and deposed by his brother Muhammad; but he retained possession of the stone in his prison, and in 1795 it became the property of his brother Sultan Shuja. In 1809, after Shuja became king of Kabul, Elphinstone saw the diamond in his bracelet at Peshawur. In 1812, Shuja, being dethroned by Muhammad, fled to Lahore, where he was detained as a quasi-prisoner by Ranjit Singh, the ruler of the Panjab. In 1813 an agreement was arrived at, and Shuja surrendered the diamond to Ranjit Singh. Ranjit often wore the stone, and it was constantly seen by European visitors to Lahore. Dying in 1839, the KOH-I-NUR was placed in the jewel-chamber till the infant Dhulip Singh was acknowledged as Ranjit's successor. In 1849 it was handed over to Sir John Lawrence on the annexation of the Panjab, and by him was sent to England to Her Majesty the Queen. In 1851 it was exhibited at the first great Exhibition, and in 1852 it was re-cut by an Amsterdam cutter, Voorsanger, in the employ of Messrs. Garrards. The weight is now 106 1/16 carats.
It would be interesting to trace the story of the "hen's egg" diamond after its acquisition by the Bijapur sultan, Ali Adil.
H. de Montfart, who travelled in India in 1608, saw a very large diamond in the possession of the Mogul emperor Jahangir at Delhi,[652] but this had been pierced. "I have seene one with the great MOGOR as bigge as a Hen's egge, and of that very forme, which he caused expressly to bee pierced like a pearle to weare it on his arme…. It weighteth 198 Mangelins."
CHAPTER B
The Wealth of the Dakhan in the Fourteenth Century A.D.
When Malik Kafur, in the year 1310 A.D., during the reign of Ala-ud-Din Khilji of Delhi, carried out his successful raids into the Dakhan and to the Malabar coast, sacking all the Hindu temples, ravaging the territory of Maisur, and despoiling the country, he is said to have returned to Delhi with an amount of treasure that seems almost fabulous. Firishtah writes: "They found in the temples prodigious spoils, such as idols of gold adorned with precious stones, and other rich effects consecrated to Hindu worship;" and Malik presented his sovereign with "312 elephants, 20,000 horses, 96,000 MANS of gold, several boxes of jewels and pearls, and other precious effects."
When we come to estimate the amount of gold we are met with a difficulty, as there are many varieties of MANS in India, the variation being as much as from 19 lbs. in Travancore to 163 1/4 lbs. in Ahmadnagar. The Madras MAN weighs 25 lbs., the Bombay MAN 28 lbs. Hawkins, writing in 1610, gives 55 lbs. to the MAN,[653] Middleton, in 1611, 33 lbs.[654] Now Firishtah had more to do with Ahmadnagar than any other part of India, and if his estimate was based on the MAN of that tract. Malik Kafur's 96,000 MANS of gold would have amounted to the enormous sum of 15,672,000 lbs. weight. It is hardly likely that Firishtah would have had in his mind the Travancore MAN. Even if he was thinking of the Madras MAN, which is not likely, his estimate of the weight of the gold carried off amounted to 2,400,000 lbs.