THE CURSE OF THE KOHINOOR Sorrow-Laden Diamonds- The Troubles Which Have Qvertaken Their Owners— Story of the Most Valuable Diamond Among the British Crown Jewels.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 113, 1 August 1885, Page 5

THE C URSE OF THE K OHINOOR Sorrow-Laden Diamonds- The Troubles Which Have Qvertaken Their Owners— Story of the Most Valuable Diamond Among the British Crown Jewels.

The belief in the cur)i&cdtrying % povter of certain precious stonea is almost- as old as the world itself. ; Emeralds and, preeminently, opals, ' are deemed- unlucky gifts. Wilkie Collins's " Moonstone " affords an in- . ,. teresting illustration of Oriental' belief s* re- 1 ' garding ill-omened jewels, andthe Kohjnoor *J diamond especially has been tboughji .a>j bearerof misfortune to all its possessors,!,, Jt, <* certainly has not been an accompaniment of ' I good in the Bast, whether one aseribW thh" vi evil that ha* followed its ownership to coin-;* " cidence or to some subtle cause. A , recent >{ writer seems to think that tne r'ecentsVents f and possible occurrences in the public <af- X fairs of Great Britain have given increased' " interest to the superstitions connected with if f the Kohinoor, or mountain of light, which became the property of the British Crown r aftertheconquestofthePunjaubinlBso. It ' was discovered in the mines of Golconda about 1650. Mir Jumia, the lessee of tha ' mines, a man notorious for his cruelty to- -■> wards his employes, presented it to his soy- . ereign, the King of Golconda. Soon> after - the King and Mir Jumia quarrelled, andthe latter teacherously invited Aurungzebe, the ' Mogul Emperor of Delhi, to invade hismaster's dominions. The invasion was a • success, and the King of Golconda became a vassal of the Emperor. He speedily rebelled, however, and lost everything. Mir , Jumia died wretchedly in exile.. Almost - simultaneously with the acquisition of the Kohinoor, Aurungzebe's hitherto uninterupted good fortune began to decline. He died in 1707, leaving his sons to engage in fratricidal war for his possessions. Shah Alum, the contestant who first got the jewel, died five years later. The next possessor lived only seven years, and within twelve years from the time of Aurungzebe it passed through the hands of five claimants. Six other competitors died during the same time. The Mogul Empire broke in pieces during the reign of the next holder of the diamond, Mohammed Shah, the grandson of Shah Alum. In 1730 Delhi was captured by Madir Shah, the Persian, who carried off $20,000,000 in booty . He^ was assassinated soon after his return to, Persia. Ahmed Abhdu, who next assumed command of the Mogul Kingdom, designed founding an Empire for himself in Afghanistan, and was crowned at Candahar in 1745 ; ho did not live very long, and his son, the eleventh possessor of the Kohinoor, had a short and unhappy reign. One of his sons put out the eyes of his brother, reigning sovereign and owner of the stone. Still another enacted the part of a rebel, but was obliged to flee to the Puojaub, carrying back the Kohinoor, He was its fifteenth and last Mohammedan possessor. Rungeefc Sing, sovereign of the Punjaub and a Hindoo, extorted the jewel from the fugitive, and very soon after died, in 1536, in his prime. His son, Kurruch Sing, was poisoned in 1840, and his son was killed by a falling beam before the funeral services of his father had begun. A civil war now broke out between the widow of Kurruch Sing and a reputed son of Rungeet Sing. The latter succeeded, but was assassinated in 1843. Two or three years of anarchy followed, and finally (1246-49), the British invaded and conquered the country. The Kohinoor, it is claimed, has proved hardly less fatal to its Christian than to its Moslem and Hindoo owners. Soon after the acquisition of the Punjaub, the Eaut Indian Company was broken up. Lord Dalhouaie, who presented the stone to tho Queen, July 31, 1850, is said by Mrs Barton, wife of the traveller, and a most earnest believer in the fatility accompanying the stone, to have died "soon after." A=? ho survived until 1860, a period of ten years, the mysterious influence was rather slow in operating. The Duke of Wellington did not fare so well. He died three months after giving the first turn to its cutting. Prince Albert has also been held up as a victim, but he lived until December, 1851, and one might as well ascribe the premature decease of Princess Alice and Prince Leopold to the same occult influence, saying nothing of the distinguished dead of 1850-54. One need not be very sceptical or philosophical t© find an explanation of the woes that have followed the ownership of the stone in Hindoostan — to the vices of the dynasties through which it passed. They would have perished just as surely without'it, unless its great value gave a special stimulus to an insurrection against its owner. There are English men and women, however, and these not even stupid fanatics, who think the deadly gem was worth possessing, notwithstanding the disasters it is working. As far as an accumulation of troubles is concerned, the Queen of England and Empress of India, or rather her respoi sible chief adviser, is busy with perplexing matters just now. The Kohinoor oame to England with reform and Corn Law abolition. The bane of Oriental despotism, may it not be also the bane of whatever of mediaeval despotism has survived in British legislation, and thus cleared the way for progress and freedom ? We may not share the superstitions of those who ascribed to it a casual power of any kind ; but certainly it will lose none of its sparkle when swollen real prooerties are reduced by equitable division ; when ancient privileges are no longer the prize of the few, and when emigration ceases to be with many the sole alternative of starvation. If the Kohinoor brings destruction, it is to the few who have dominated over the many, thus insuring final order out of immediate chaos, — "Boston Times."