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Decorations: Burmese

An account of the jewel-decorated carriage of a Burmese sovereign, captured by the English in 1825 at Tavoy, a seaport in the Burmese Empire, and illustrations of this wonderful object are given in Hone's "Every-day Book" (vol. 1). It is said to have occupied three years in building, at an expense of pound3,125. The jewels which decorated it were valued at pound12,500. On the forepart of the frame of the carriage, mounted on a silver pedestal, was the Tee-bearer, a small carved image with a lofty gold wand in his hands, surmounted with a small Tee, the emblem of sovereignty. The figure was richly dressed in green velvet, the front laced with diamonds, with a triple belt round the body, of blue sapphires, emeralds, and diamonds; his leggings were also embroidered with sapphires. In front of his cap was a rich cluster of white sapphires, with a double star of rubies and emeralds; it was also thickly studded with carbuncles. The pagoda roof of the carriage was bordered with amethysts, emeralds, diamonds, garnets, hyacinths, rubies, and other precious stones. The seat or throne of the carriage was covered with jewels, the central belt being particularly rich in oriental stones of rare value. At each end of the throne was the figure of a mythological lion, the feet and teeth of which were of pearl, and the bodies covered with sapphires, hyacinths, emeralds, diamonds, rubies, etc.

In our own times we have the gorgeous splendour of the East shown, amongst other things, in the horse-trappings of the Shah of Persia, who, on his late visit to England, astonished the beholders with the profusion of precious stones with which the saddle of his charger was covered. The same rich display in the decoration of their horses and elephants, was shown by the Indian princes on the visit of the Prince of Wales. The knights of old, proud of their spurs, were not content with steel ones. Brass and silver were pressed into service, and spurs were chased, gilt, decorated with jewels, and adorned with mottoes.

AEneas Sylvius (afterwards Pius II.), in the fifteenth century, writes with great admiration of the wealth of the German cities, although even then their splendour began to decline:--"What shall I say of the neckchains of the men, and the bridles of the horses, which are made of the purest gold; and of the spears and scabbards, which are covered with jewels?" Our "Merry Monarch," Charles II., decorated his stirrups with three hundred and twenty diamonds.

The Scriptural allusions to precious stones are numerous, and the value and importance are seen in their application to sacred purposes; as, for instance, the adornment of the breastplate of the high-priest, etc. In Exodus we read of the jewels of silver and gold borrowed by the Israelites from the Egyptians. In the twenty-eighth chapter of Job we find mention of silver, gold, iron, brass (copper), sapphires, onyxes, topazes, rubies, pearls, coral, and crystal, which imply a knowledge of the art of mining and the practice of navigation. The mineral and metallic substances are described as lying "concealed in the dark caverns of the earth, where light and darkness meet, where the lion's foot hath not trod, nor the piercing eye of the vulture hath reached"; as being extracted thence by persevering labour and skill, ardent in the pursuit of wealth. There is no difficulty in this description respecting the particular minerals and metals and the precious stone called the sapphire. But the exact signification of the Hebrew words render coral, crystal, onyx, ruby, topaz, and pearl, still much contested among the learned. The plural word peninim, there rendered "pearls," refers, according to Bruce, to that species called the red pearl, the pinnae of the Greeks, and mentioned by Strabo AElian, Theophrastus, and Pliny. Bruce also says that our translators have also erred in translating peninim by "rubies," in the end of the eighteenth verse, as the word always signifies "pearls." The navy of Hiram (the Tyrian monarch) that brought gold from Ophir to King Solomon, conveyed also precious stones from the same place. Jewels were also purchased from the merchants of Sheba, or Sabaea, and Rumah, or Regma, countries in the south part of Arabia. The prophet Ezekiel, in his lamentations for Tyre, exclaims, "The merchants of Sheba and Raamah occupied in thy fairs, with chief of all spices, and with all precious stones and gold."