One of those supershort Ripley pieces tells a strange story. A village in India commonly received rain including pre-drilled beads. The natives gathered them and strung them into ‘King Solomon’s Rosaries’.
Several old books note that Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists use rosaries; the Buddhist version is well known.
Finally found the source of Ripley’s story. It’s in a 1912 Gazetteer about India.
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Bijori is a small village close to Amgaon and Niwas in Dindori Tahsil. As a village it has no particular merit, but in the rains a number of beads of different form, size, and colour are found in the fields, ready bored for necklaces. The number seems to be unlimited; the beads are known as Sulaimandana, or the rosary of Solomon, and are very highly prized by both Hindus and Mussalmans.
= = = = = END QUOTE.
Found in the fields may give a clue to what really happened. It doesn’t say that the beads fell in your hand when you stood in the rain.
Guessing: An anonymous beadefactor, perhaps the local monastery, wanted to give the people a reason for faith and a sense of divine blessing so they would attend services more often. Self-liquidating praymiums.
Polistra's Mill 