The Kohinoor Diamond, whose name means "Mountain of Light" in Persian, was formerly fixed in place as the left eye of the Hindu goddess Bhadrakali in the Indian town of Warangal.
#LongThread
#LongThread
Koh-i-Noor was first extracted from the renowned "Kollur mine (Coulour or Gani)" diamond mine in the Guntur District of Andhra Pradesh, India.
This diamond was owned by the Kakatiya dynasty, which dominated much of the Telugu-speaking regions of what are now Telangana and Andhra Pradesh states in India from 1083 CE to 1323 CE. Its capital was Orugallu (now Warangal).
Around 625 AD, King Pulakesi II of the Chalukya dynasty built the temple of Goddess Bhadrakali to honor his victory over the Vengi district of Andhra Desam.
Later, the Kakatiyas kept this as the left eye of the statue when they adopted her as their "Kula Devatha," giving her primacy over other gods.
* Curse on Kohinoor Diamond
Ghiyāth al-Dīn Tughluq ordered his commander Ulūgh Khān to battle the Kākatīya king Prātaparuḑra in 1323 after the Tughlaq dynasty succeeded the Khiljī dynasty in 1320 AD.
Ghiyāth al-Dīn Tughluq ordered his commander Ulūgh Khān to battle the Kākatīya king Prātaparuḑra in 1323 after the Tughlaq dynasty succeeded the Khiljī dynasty in 1320 AD.
Ulūgh Khān’s raid was thwarted, but he came again a month later with a more powerful and determined army. This time, the champion army of the Delhi Sultanate captured the diamond after defeating the ill-equipped Kakātīya army.
It was then owned by the Tughlaq Dynasty and Lodī Dynasty, and finally came into the possession of Bābur himself in 1526. He called the stone ‘the Diamond of Bābur‘ at the time, although it had been called by other names before he seized it from Ibrāhīm Lodī.
Both Bābur and Humāyūn mention in their memoirs the origins of ‘the Diamond of Bābur‘. The last of the Tomaras, Man Singh Tomar, negotiated peace with Sikandar Lodī, Sultan of Delhi and became a vassal of the Delhi Sultanate
A miniature of Emir Ahmad Shāh Durrānī from 1757 shows the Koh-i-Noor diamond dangling above his brow from the front of his crown.
Humāyūn had much bad luck throughout his life. Sher Shāh Sūrī, who defeated Humāyūn, died in the flames of a burst cannon. Humāyūn’s son, Akbar, never kept the diamond with him and later only Shāh Jahān took it out of his treasury.
Akbar’s grandson, Shāh Jahān was overthrown by his own son, Aurangzēb. Shah Jahan, famous for building the Taj Mahal in Agra, had the stone placed into his ornate Peacock Throne. His son, Aurangazēb, imprisoned his ailing father at nearby Agra Fort.
While in the possession of Aurangazēb, it was cut by Hortenso Borgia, a Venetian lapidary, who was so clumsy that he reduced the weight of the stone to 186 carats, while the original diamond was 793 carats.
Legend has it that he had the Koh-i-Noor positioned near a window so that Shāh Jahān could see the Tāj Mahal only by looking at its reflection in the stone. Aurangazēb later brought it to his capital Lahore and placed it in his own personal Bādshāhī Mosque.
There it stayed until the invasion of Nādir Shāh of Iran in 1739 and the sacking of Agra and Delhi. Along with the Peacock Throne, he also carried off the Koh-i-Noor to Persia in 1739.
It was allegedly Nādir Shāh who exclaimed Koh-i-Noor! when he finally managed to obtain the famous stone, and this is how the stone gained its present name. There is no reference to this name before 1739.
The valuation of the Koh-i-Noor is given in the legend that one of Nādir Shāh’s consorts supposedly said,
“If a strong man should take five stones, and throw one north, one south, one east, and one west, and the last straight up into the air, and the space between filled with gold and gems, that would equal the value of the Koh-i-Noor.”
After the assassination of Nādir Shāh in 1747, the stone came into the hands of his general, Ahmad Shāh Durrānī of Afghanistan.
In 1830, Shujāh Shāh Durrānī, the deposed ruler of Afghanistan, managed to flee with the diamond. He went to Lahore where Ranjīt Singh forced him to surrender it.
Ranjīt Singh was crowned ruler of the Punjab region. In 1829 on his death bed, according to custom in India, Ranjith Singh wished to donate the diamond to a temple.
He wanted to donate it to Lord Jagannath of the Puri temple in Odisha. However, after his death in 1839 the British administrators did not execute his will.
On 29 March 1849, the British raised their flag on the citadel of Lahore, and Punjab was formally proclaimed part of the British Empire in India. One of the terms of the Treaty of Lahore, the legal agreement formalizing this occupation, was as follows:
The gem called the Koh-i-Noor which was surrenderd by Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk to Maharajah Ranjit Singh and then surrendered by the Maharajah of Lahore to the Queen of England.
The Governor-General in charge of the ratification for this treaty was Lord Dalhousie and he arranged that the diamond be presented by Maharaja Ranjīt Singh’s young successor, Dulīp Singh, to Queen Victoria in 1850.
Dulīp Singh was the youngest son of Ranjīt Singh and his fifth wife Maharani Jind Kaur. Dulīp, aged 13, traveled to the United Kingdom to present the jewel.
The presentation of the Koh-i-Noor and the Timur ruby to Queen Victoria was the latest in the long history of transfers of the stones as a spoil of war.
The entire history of Kohinoor suggests that whichever king possesed it, died soon.
A text from the time of Koh-i-Noor’s first authenticated appearance in 1306 states that the stone carries a curse lethal to male owners. It read: “Only God or a woman can wear it with impunity.”
A text from the time of Koh-i-Noor’s first authenticated appearance in 1306 states that the stone carries a curse lethal to male owners. It read: “Only God or a woman can wear it with impunity.”
All male Kings who owned it, died sooner than normal.
After Goddess Bhadrakali, it was British Queen who possessed it for longer time without any major harm, though British Empire started declining from 1857 AD (7 years after the diamond went to England).
Fearing the curse, the present Queen avoids wearing the Kohinoor diamond and instead wears the Imperial State Crown.
But still the British wishes to keep this diamond in their collection even after losing multiple countries and colonies from their rule.
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