The magic of jewels and charms / by George Frederick Kunz.

  • Kunz, George Frederick, 1856-1932.
Date:
1915
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The magic of jewels and charms / by George Frederick Kunz. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    these words. However, it appears probable that while shamir signifies a form of coiaindum, the word adamas, as used by the early Greek writers, denoted a hard, metallic substance. Possibly, when iron first became known to the Greeks, the adjective dda/idvrivo^^ ‘indomitable,^’ was ap¬ plied to it, and later the noun adamas was formed from this adjective and was used by the poets to signify an imaginary substance even harder than iron; hence, when the diamond became known in Greek lands, its extreme hardness sug¬ gested the application to it of this name.^^ An Arab legend concerning the fabled shamir stone is related by Cazwini in his cosmography. When King Solo¬ mon set about building the temple in Jerusalem, he com¬ manded Satan to dress the stones that were to be used, but the work was performed with such demoniac energy that the people round about complained bitterly of the dreadful noise. To remedy this trouble, Solomon sought the council of the leading scribes and also that of the evil spirits known as If rites and Jinns. None of them, however, was able to help him in this difficulty, but on© of them advised him to question an apostate named Sahr, who sometimes had special knowledge of such things. When called upon for his opinion, Sahr declared that he knew of a stone that would do the work required, but did not know where it could be found; nevertheless he believed that, by a stratagem, he could se¬ cure possession of it. He thereupon ordered that an eagle’s nest with its eggs should be brought to him, and also a bottle¬ shaped vessel made of very strong glass. Into this he slipped the eggs, put them back into the nest, and had nest and eggs replaced where they had been found. When the “ See Finder, “ De adamante,” Berolini, 1829, pp. 70 sqq,, where the use of the word adamas to designate iron is said to have been conjectured by Schneider, in his “ Analecta ad hist, rei met. vet.,” pp. 5, 6. Adamas as a man’s name occurs in the “ Iliad,” xii, 140 and xiii, 560.