Rudraksha

Kew's Plants of the World Online gives the native range of Elaeocarpus sphaericus as the Himalaya to northern Myanmar (Assam, Bangladesh, the eastern and western Himalaya, Myanmar and Nepal), growing mainly in the wet tropical biome. A review in the World Journal of Pharmaceutical Research reports that rudraksha grows in tropical and subtropical areas from the coast up to about 2000 m and, in India, in Uttarakhand, Assam, Bihar, Sikkim, Bengal, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh; the Guokr article adds that it occurs in Hainan, Yunnan and Guangxi in China, with the main production in mainland Southeast Asia.

A normal rudraksha stone has five locules and therefore five segments; beads with fewer than five or more than six segments come from variation in carpel number when the flower forms. Beads with eight or more segments are scarce and priced higher, and the Guokr article warns that fakes made by sawing and gluing pieces together have appeared. A cross-section shows the separate locules of the stone.

Rudraksha is a Sanskrit compound of Rudra, one of the Vedic names of the Hindu god Shiva, and aksha, read as 'tear drops', so the name is explained as 'Rudra's teardrops'. The beads are traditionally used as prayer beads in Hinduism, especially in Shaivism, and also in Buddhism and Jainism, and are traded within India and abroad.

In Hindu tradition rudraksha beads are regarded as one of the most sacred insignia, and beads are classified by their number of faces (mukhi), each face count being associated with particular deities and symbolic meanings; for example, the one-faced bead is said to symbolise Shiva.