Dammar

Dammar, a series of copalline resins, hard, transparent, brittle, straw-coloured, and odourless when solid, soluble in ether, benzol, or chloroform. Much of that in commerce is the produce of Dammara orientalis, the Amboyna pine, a native of Java and the Moluccas, reaching 100 feet in height, and comes to us from Batavia and through Singapore, whence Britain imports 1,000 tons annually. D. australis, the Cowdie or Kauri pine of New Zealand, 150 to 200 feet high, yields a similar resin known as Kauri gum, worth £6 to £10 per cwt., as also do D. ovata, D. Cookii, D. lanceolata, of New Caledonia, D. robusta, of Queensland, and D. vitiensis, of Fiji. In New Zealand this resin is also found fossil. In India several similar resins, little known in western commerce, are known as dammar. They are used as incense; but with us are valued for varnish-making. White dammar, or Piney varnish, is the produce of Vateria indica and V. acuminata; black dammar, of Canarium strictum; Sal dammar, of Shorea robusta; and Rock dammar, of Hopea micrantha.