(via Roman Book On Precious Stones: 1950) Sydney H Ball writes:
While all of the then known world was ransacked by Rome for precious stones, India was considered the source of par excellence of fine gems. The Indians, having neither copper nor lead mines, ‘ are content to part with their pearls and precious stones unto merchants by way of counterchange of metals.’ Indeed, metals have always moved east in exchange for gems, spices, and silk from the Orient. Rome paid for its luxuries, not only with base and precious metals (for even then India was the sink of gold and silver), but to a much lesser extent with textiles, amber, emeralds, peridot, coral, glassware, and wine. Roman gold coins of Tiberius and Nero (42 B.C – 68 A.D) are commonly found on the Malabar coast. Pliny states that yearly precious metals worth the equivalent of $4,250,000 were exported from Rome to India. The debasement of coinage under Nero was, in part at least, due to India’s favorable trade balance.
The Indian origin of sardonyx, of many classical engraved gems, and even of sapphire ornaments is attested by the fact that such gems are pierced for suspension as beads.
Ceylon and India were in commercial contact, at least by 543 B.C, and the name of the island was known to the officers of Alexander the Great. Megasthenes (about 300 B.C) mentions the pearls of Ceylon but not its precious stones. In the time of the Emperor Claudius (reign began 41 A.D), Annius Plocamus had farmed the revenues of the Red Sea. One of his freedmen sailing around Arabia was carried by adverse winds to landfall on Ceylon. He stayed there six months and, as a result, the king of Ceylon, seeking an alliance with Rome, sent Rachias and three others on embassy to Rome. These Singhalese informed the Emperor Claudius that in their country they valued greatly their pearls and precious stones. The precious stones of Ceylon in Pliny’s time, however, were still received indirectly through India, for direct commerce between Rome and Ceylon did not start until about 150 A.D. We may, however, add that the author of the Periplus, a contemporary of Pliny, mentions that Ceylon produces transparent stones. Ptolemy, an Alexandrian living about 150 A.D, mentions beryl and sapphire as products of Ceylon. In his time Graeco-Egyptian traders apparently knew the island well. Cosmas Indicopleustes probably gained his knowledge of Ceylon’s wealth in gems from Sopatrus, a Romanized Greek who visited Ceylon about 519 A.D although Cosmas himself may have visited India. At Sigiriya and other ancient Ceylonese cities, Roman coins of the 2nd and 5th centuries are frequently found.
Roman coins of the 2nd century A.D have recently been found among the ruins of Indo-Chinese towns. India and China seem to have had commercial relations as early as the 4th century B.C. Alexander the Great’s admiral, Nearchus, knew of ‘Seriancloths which reached India from the north.’ In 140 B.C. Chinese ships with cargo of gold and silks sailed for Conjevaram, a port near Madras. This cargo they expected to exchange for pearls, crystal, and precious stones. An embassy from China was received by Mithridates II of Parthia (124-88 B.C). Of course, Rome and Parthia were in commercial contact in the 1st century B.C. Horace (65-8 B.C) mentions the Seres. Virgil in the Georgics, published in 31 B.C, knew of Chinese silk and how the ‘Seres comb the slender fleeces from the leaves’. In the time of the Emperor Augustus, overland trade continued between China and Parthia, the Chinese traders going westward as far as the Stone Tower, approximately were Balkh now stands. Silk was the great trade incentive between China and the West, and this trade expanded markedly toward the second half of the 2nd century B.C. The historian Florus mentions Chinese among the foreigners who came to the court of Augustus. He says: ‘Nay the Seres came likewise and the Indians who dwelt beneath the vertical sun, bringing the presents of precious stones and pearls and elephants.’ But even in Pliny’s time, Rome and China were not yet in direct commercial contact, although the products of the two countries were known to one another. Amber from Rome reached China probably through Syria, while jade was used to a small extent by the Romans. It may be added that Roman coins have been found in the Chinese province of Shansi dating from the time of Tiberius (14-37 A.D) to that of Aurelian (212-275 A.D). Pliny mentions the iron and furs of Seres. So, for a considerable time, India served as the link between the two great empires of the time, China and Rome. Marinus of Tyre, in the 2nd century A.D, says that in his time Rome exported amber to China and a Chinese work of 350 A.D. mentions amber as an export of Rome to China. In 97 A.D. Pan Ch’ao, the famous Chinese general, dispatched his aide westward as an ambassador, and he at least reached Babylonia. He speaks of the tenfold profits enjoyed by the Roman merchants trading in India, and of the riches in precious stones of what must have been modern Antoich. Marcus Aurelius is said to have sent ambassadors to China in 166 A.D, but instead of an official embassy, it may have been but a party of Syrian merchants.
The Egyptians apparently first instituted tariffs on precious stones and a century before Pliny’s time we know what duties were paid on gems upon entering Egypt and again at Alexandria when re-exported. Tiberius Gracchus, about 133 B.C, established duties on various luxuries entering Rome. Cicero (106-43 B.C) in Pro lege Manilia mentions three Roman import duties, the first being the Portoria, or that paid at a Roman port of entry. Later, precious stones, like other luxuries, paid a high duty on entering the Roman empire; for example, under the Emperor Augustus (31 B.C – 14 A.D), articles of luxury paid from two and one half of twelve and one half percent ad valorem, precious stones being in the higher brackets. Customs duties also existed between various Roman provinces. Other tariff laws were enacted under the Emperors Marcus Aurelius, Commodus, and Alexander Severus. Under the law of Severus (222-235 A.D), the diamond and the emerald paid a duty of twelve and one half per cent.
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