Excerpted from Francis Buchanan’s travelogue:
June 1800. 16 June.—I remained at Magadi, endeavoring to complete my collection of the various timber trees. I went also to Ghettipura to inquire after the iron mines: but was informed by the officers of government, that, nobody having wrought them for some years, their situation was not now known. After a long search, however, they had found a few stones, which they sent, believing that they might be iron-ore. I then sent for the man who had given me the information; and on the following day,
17th June, -- I took him along with me to Ghettipura, where I not only found the ore in several places, but also the pits, from which the people were then actually taking it to supply their furnaces. I am at some loss to account for this desire of concealment relative to minerals, which also extends to every kind of quarry throughout the country, and which equally pervades the officers of government and the other inhabitants. Men, who have given me apparently correct information relative to their farms, have eagerly denied a knowledge of the fossile kingdom, which they, no doubt, possessed, and for which denial I can assign no plausible motive. The late Sultan, indeed, is said to have harassed his subjects exceedingly, by making them work at quarries, and also to have been very severe on the smelters of iron; and the people may have suspected, that my inquiries might lead to similar oppressions; but according to the iron-smelters’ own account, the Sultan gave them a high price for their iron, that he compelled them to work much harder than they were inclined to do, and that they were defrauded by those who were entrusted with the payment.
Much steel was formerly made at Ghettipura, from whence it derives its name, which signifies literally hard town. It is a small village situated by the compass WSW from Savana-durga, and is distant from Magadi about seven miles. Near it are many cultivated fields intermixed with low rocky hills. The ore is found both in the fields and hills. (p.619)
The iron ore of the fields consists of small irregular masses, separated by thin layers of earthy matter, and is found in beds that are from five to ten feet deep, which have only been wrought in a few places, where they come so near the surface that they have been discovered by the plough. It is probable, that by digging deep they might be found to be of great extent. The small masses are easily beaten into powder, and then the black sand is readily separated, by washing, from the clay and sand that are the other ingredients in their composition. This ore is of two kinds; one efflorescing into red ochre, the other into yellow. Intermixed with both these kinds of ore, which are called female stones, are many lumps of what the natives call male stone. It appears to me to be composed of the same materials with the female stone, but is so hard, that the imperfect manipulations of the natives cannot reduce it to a powder, and of course they cannot separate the earthy matter. It is, therefore, looked upon a useless, fluxes being totally unknown to the miners of Mysore. The female stone appears to me to be the male in a state of decay.
The iron ore of the hills is also male and female; the latter being the only one used; and this is also, in my opinion, the male in a state of dissolution. The male stone in the hills bears a much larger proportion to the female than it does in the fields. This ore also is found on digging a very little depth into the soil, and seems to be the source from whence most of the black sand of the country is washed by the rain. It appears to me to differ from the quartz impregnated with iron, which I mentioned in the account of the Pedda Nayakana durga Ghats, only by containing a large quantity of metal. The female stone is very easily reduced to a powder; and the iron sand is readily separated, by washing, from the quartzose sand, which is the other ingredient in the ore. It is not so rich in metal as the ore found in the fields. These two ores are called aduru cullu, or stones containing iron sand.
Ta. ayil iron. Ma. ayir, ayiram any ore. Ka. aduru native metal. Tu. ajirda karba very hard iron. (DEDR 19)
இருப்புமணல் iruppu-maṇal , n. < id. +. Sand containing iron; ironstone; இரும்புகலந்த மண். அதர் atar Fine sand; நுண்மணல். (பிங்.) அயிர் ayir [M. ayir.] Fine sand; நுண்மணல். (முல்லைப். 92.) அயில் ayil , n. cf. ayas. 1. Iron; இரும்பு அயிலாலே போழ்ப வயில் (பழமொ. 8).
On the surface of the hills is found another iron ore called ipanada, which is scattered among the gravel in small lumps, from the size of an egg downwards. They are a pure ore, and are put in the furnace without any preparation, except breaking the larger pieces into bits about the size of a filbert. The quantity of ipanada required for one furnace is exactly the same, by measure, as that of Aduru; but the weight of ipanada is of course less, there being more space occupied by interstices, from the greater size of the pieces. The produce of iron from both is the same. The surface of the lumps of ipanada is often covered with kind of black enamel. [It is unclear if the ipa-nada may refer to iruppu 'iron' (Tamil)].
18th June. – I passed this day in the woods near Savana-durga, investigating their productions. The woodmen are a poor ignorant race, most of them of the lowest cast, called Whalliaru; but they always pretend to know every plant of which the name is asked. They have also a number of specific appellations, such as bily, white; kempu, red; cari, black; doda, large; chica, small; betta, mountain; wullay, cultivated; cadu, wild; timbo, eatable; and the like; many of which they often apply to the same species, and sometimes the same name to different species, with so little accuracy, that any person, who depends on their accounts will find himself thrown into great confusion.
19th June .—I was obliged to remain at Magadi still another day to complete my collection of forest trees, and to procure specimens of the stones from the best quarries.
The stones are employed in building temples at Magadi, are, 1st. The granitic porphyry, or the granite which contains large masses of red feldspar in a small grained mixture of grey quarts and back mica, and which I described at Rama-giri. Near Savana-durga there is an excellent quarry of this stone. (John Pinkerton, 1811, A general collection of the best and most interesting voyages and travels in all parts of the world; many of which are now first translated into English. Digested on a New Plan, Volume the Eighth, London, Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown, Paternoster-Row; and Cadell and Davies, in the Strand, pp.620-621).
The volume 8 of this extraordinary collections of travelogues by explorers from England and concerns Hindostan. The volume includes Sir Thomas Roe’s voyage to India, Bernier’s voyage to the East Indies, Tavernier’s voyages, Hamilton’s account of the East Indies, A discovery of two foreign sects in the East Indies by Henry Lord (Lord’s discovery of the Banians and Persees), A journey from Madras through the countries of Mysore, Canara, and Malabar by Francis Buchanan, M.D. (London 1807, 3 vols.).
It is in this section excerpted from Francis Hamilton/Barnet Buchanans’ publications from 1798 to 1833, and included in Pages 573 to 776 is this account about aduru is included. Buchanan’s is an account of physical and human geography of India, in general, of Mysore, Canara, Malabar, Districts of Shahabad, Purnea, Dinajpur, Patna and Gaya, in particular. Buchanan has also documented his discoveries in Kingdom of Nepal and about the fishes found in the river Ganges and its branches and about the plants of various parts of India. He has also recorded the genealogical tables of the deities, princes, heroes and remarkable personages of the Hindus, extracted from the sacred writings of that people, A comparison of the soiling behavior of Dacron-and-cotton fabrics, A comparative vocabulary of some of the languages spoken in the Burma empire, Description of the tree called by the Burmans Launzan, An account of Assam.
Dr. Francis Buchanan was the first statistical inquirer employed by the British Government in India to detail information concerning the occupations and industries of the people of India. He was a medical officer in the employ of the East India Company and documented the resources and manufactures of many parts of India and Burma. Romesh Chunder Dutt used the results of these surveys extensively in his work, The Economic History of India, J.M.Dent, London, 1905.
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