Related stories

Spring Festival Captures Chinese Heart and Soul What the Chinese Zodiac Holds for you Korean TV Series Grips Chinese Viewers Mainland, Hong Kong Co-Produce World's Best Chinese Films Revered Chinese Author Ba Jin Dies at 100

Prehistoric Chinese Used Diamonds

Ancient Chinese craftsmen might have learned to use diamonds to grind and polish ceremonial stone burial axes as long as 6,000 years ago, say US researchers, according to China Daily.

Researchers at Harvard University have uncovered strong evidence that the ancient Chinese used diamonds with a level of skill, difficult to achieve even with modern polishing techniques.

The finding, reported in the February issue of the journal Archaeometry, places this earliest known use of diamonds worldwide thousands of years earlier than they are known to have been used elsewhere. Scientists had put the earliest use of diamonds around 500 BC.

The stone-worked into polished axes by China's Liangzhu and Sanxingcun cultures was corundum, known as ruby in its red form and sapphire in all other colours.