Table Of ContentCowrie Shells and Cowrie Money
Originating in the sea, especially in the waters surrounding the low-lying islands
of the Maldives, Cypraea moneta (sometimes confused with C ypraea annulus )
was transported to various parts of Afro-Eurasia in the prehistoric era, and in
many cases, it was gradually transformed into a form of money in various societies
for a long span of time. Yang provides a global examination of cowrie money
within and beyond Afro-Eurasia from the archaeological period to the early
twentieth century.
By focusing on cowrie money in Indian, Chinese, Southeast Asian and West
African societies and shell money in Pacifi c and North American societies, Yang
synthesises and illustrates the economic and cultural connections, networks and
interactions over a longue durée and in a cross-regional context. Analysing locally
varied experiences of cowrie money from a global perspective, Yang argues that
cowrie money was the fi rst global money that shaped Afro-Eurasian societies
both individually and collectively. He proposes a paradigm of the cowrie money
world that engages local, regional, transregional and global themes.
Bin Yang is Associate Professor of History at the University of Macau. His
research interests include Chinese history, frontier and ethnic studies, Sino-
Southeast Asian-Indian triangular interactions, world history and history of
science, technology and medicine. His dissertation “Between Winds and Clouds:
The Making of Yunnan (Second Century BCE – Twentieth Century CE)” won
the 2004 Gutenberg-e Prize of the American Historical Association, and it was
published online as well as in print by Columbia University Press. He has published
research papers in some internationally prestigious journals such as T he China
Quarterly, Modern Asian Studies, Journal of World History, Bulletin of the History
of Medicine and Journal of Women’s History. He is one of the founding members
of the Asian Association of World Historians and serves as Managing Editor of
the A sian Review of World Histories .
Routledge Approaches to History
History, Ethics, and the Recognition of the Other
A Levinasian View on the Writing of History
Anton Froeyman
The Historiography of Transition
Critical Phases in the Development of Modernity (1494–1973)
Edited by Paolo Pombeni
The Emergence of Historical Forensic Expertise
Clio Takes the Stand
Vladimir Petrović
Historical Mechanisms
An Experimental Approach to Applying Scientifi c Theories to the Study of History
Andreas Boldt
Values, Objectivity, and Explanation in Historiography
Tor Egil Førland
The Work of History
Constructivism and a Politics of the Past
Kalle Pihlainen
History and Sociology in France
From Scientifi c History to the Durkheimian School
Robert Leroux
Universal History and the Making of the Global
Edited by Hall Bjørnstad, Helge Jordheim and Anne Régent-Susini
Cowrie Shells and Cowrie Money
A Global History
Bin Yang
For more information about this series, please visit: w ww.routledge.com/Routledge-
Approaches-to-History/book-series/RSHISTHRY
Cowrie Shells and
Cowrie Money
A Global History
Bin Yang
First published 2019
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2019 Bin Yang
The right of Bin Yang to be identifi ed as authors of this work has
been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identifi cation and
explanation without intent to infringe.
Sponsored by the Publication Grant, the Harvard-Yenching Institute,
October 2018
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Yang, Bin, 1972– author.
Title: Cowrie shells and cowrie money : a global history / Bin Yang.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2019. |
Series: Routledge approaches to history ; 25 | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2018033527 | ISBN 9781138593213 (hardback) |
ISBN 9780429489587 (e-book)
Subjects: LCSH: Shell money. | Cowries. | Money—History.
Classifi cation: LCC GN450.5 .Y34 2019 | DDC 332.4/04—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018033527
ISBN: 978-1-138-59321-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-48958-7 (ebk)
Typeset in Galliard
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
Contents
List of fi gures, tables and maps viii
Foreword x
Acknowledgements xiii
1 Global phenomenon, local varieties 1
Across Afro-Eurasia 1
The life of the cowrie mollusc 3
Why Cypraea moneta? And why in the Maldives? 5
Money and cowrie shells becoming money 6
World history: global and local 9
Scholarship, sources and structure 12
2 The Maldives: procurement and export 20
The Maldives: a history 20
Dried fi sh and coir rope 24
Cowrie shells: in the eyes of the Arabs 25
Ibn Battuta in the Maldives 26
Chinese accounts 29
“A great emporium for all parts” 33
The cowrie trade in the eyes of François Pyrard 35
3 India: in the beginning 40
Non-monetary use of cowrie shells 41
Cowrie money: early records 42
Pala and Sena: from coins to cowrie money 45
From coast to inland: the village of Alagum 47
Tanka and cowries 49
Cowrie money: European accounts 51
Assam 54
Northern India 55
vi Contents
Cowrie money in the Gentoo Code 56
British India: acknowledgement and replacement 59
Collecting and counting cowries in Sylhet 62
A fortune made through cowries 65
4 Southeast Asia: intra-Asian interactions 73
Cowrie money in Thai inscriptions 74
The Chiang Mai Chronicle 77
The laws of King Mengrai 80
The Siamese-Yunnan connection 84
Cowrie money in Southeast Asia: Tomè Pires 85
The Chinese accounts 88
5 Yunnan: an Indian infl uence in the Southeast
Asian-Chinese world 94
From Southeast Asia to a Chinese province 94
Cowrie shells in early Yunnan: nature and source 96
Cowrie money in Mongol Yunnan 102
Cowries from Jiangnan (the Yangzi Delta) 105
Illegal cowries 107
Routes linking Bengal, coastal mainland Southeast Asia
and Yunnan 109
Functions of cowrie money 110
The collapse: global and local 114
6 Why not in early China? 124
Where did cowries come from? 125
Mortuary cowries 130
Cowrie shells as money in early China 136
Cowries not as money! 139
Why didn’t cowries become money? 142
Bronze cowries: one of China’s earliest monies 144
In South China: the case of Sanxingdui 149
Mouth-cowries and hand-cowries 153
7 West Africa: connecting the worlds, old and new 160
When did cowrie shells reach Africa? 161
The routes from the Maldives to West Africa 162
Cowrie money: prior to the fourteenth century 164
The cowrie money zone: prior to 1500 167
The cowrie money zone: 1500–1900 168
The Portuguese 171
Contents vii
The Dutch and English 173
Cowries for slaves: the eighteenth century 174
The Hannibal 177
Cowries for palm oil: the nineteenth century 181
Local agents 183
The making of the Kingdom of Dahomey: cowries, slaves and
palm oil 184
Counting cowries: local and global? 190
Cowrie money in East Africa 194
The end of the cowrie trade 195
8 The Pacifi c Islands and North America: out of the
Bengali system 204
Independent monetary origin 205
Cowrie use in New Guinea 206
Cowrie money in the Kapauku 207
Contact and collapse 209
Shells and shell money in North America 212
“An oyster crusade” in New Netherland 217
Wampum in California: Ernest Ingersoll’s account 219
Was wampum used as money or not? 220
A means of exchange in colonial Virginia?: Cowrie shells
from Africa 222
9 More than just money 229
Aesthetics, wealth, fertility and protection 229
Were cowries used against the evil eye? 233
The cowrie culture in the Yoruba 241
Cowrie money remembered 244
10 The cowrie money world 248
The fi rst global money: global practice vs local realisations 249
Making or failing cowrie money: market and state 252
Cowries and the rise of the west 255
Asian interactions reconsidered 257
The cowrie money world 259
Bibliography 270
Index 286
Figures, tables and maps
Figures
1.1 External Anatomy of Cowrie 4
4.1 The Three Kings Monument 75
4.2 King Mengrai, “The Great Genesis King Who Built the Chiang
Mai City” 79
4.3 City Wall of Old Chiang Mai 80
5.1 Cowrie Shells in the Dian Kingdom 97
5.2 Four-Buffalo and One-Horse Gold-Gilt Rider
( Siniu liujin qishi ; 四牛鎏金骑士) Bronze Container 98
5.3 Horse-Taming ( Xunma ; 驯 马 ) Bronze Container 98
5.4 Weaving ( Fangzhi ; 纺织 ) Bronze Container 99
6.1a Cowrie Shells Found in the Yin Ruins ( Yinxu ; 殷墟) of the
Shang Dynasty (c. 1600 BCE–1046 BCE), including C ypraea
Moneta and Mauritia Arabica ( Awenshoubei; 阿文 绶贝) , Anyang,
Henan Province, Yinxu Museum 126
6.1b Cowrie Shells Discovered in Shandong Province 129
6.2a A Bronze Cowrie of the Late Shang Period 132
6.2b Gilt Bronze Cowries (back and front) 133
6.2c Two Jade Cowrie Shells 133
6.2d Tridacnidae ( chequ ; 砗磲) Cowries 134
6.2e Steatite Cowries 134
6.2f Four Bone Cowries 135
6.2g A Pile of Bone Cowries 135
6.3 Ancient Chinese Scripts for the Character Bei (Shell) 141
6.4 Ghost-Face Coins 145
6.5 Ghost-Face Coin Mould 147
6.6 Spade Coin (B ubi : 布币) with a Character of “Bei” 148
6.7 Gilt Cowrie-Shaped Decorative Bronze Buckle 149
6.8a Cowrie Shells Discovered in Sanxingdui 150
6.8b Triple-Chained Bronze Cowries 151
6.8c A Turquoise Cowrie in Sanxingdui 151
7.1 Cowrie Shell Girdle of Sithathoryunet 161
7.2 The King of Dahomey 188
Figures, tables and maps ix
8.1 Wampum, Eighteenth Century, New England 213
8.2 Oneida Wampum Strings, c. 1900 216
Tables
1.1 Habitat and Length of C ypraea Moneta (mm) 6
3.1 Denomination of Cowrie Shells in India 64
5.1 Standardisation of Exchange Rate Between Cowrie and One
Silver Tael 104
5.2 The Denomination of Cowrie Shells in Yunnan 104
7.1 Cowries to One Ounce of Gold 170
7.2 Cowrie Imports to West Africa by Decade, 1700–1799 176
7.3 Approximate Slave Price in Pounds ( lbs ) of Cowries 176
7.4 British Cowrie Exports to West Africa, 1818–1850 181
7.5 Palm Oil Exports from West Africa (Some Individual Years in the
Nineteenth Century) 181
7.6 Goods and Price (in Cowries) at Whydah, March 1850 187
7.7 The Bambara Counting System 191
7.8 The Numeric Systems of the Egala and Yoruba 193
7.9 Counting Patterns of Cowrie Money 193
Maps
1.1 The World of C ypraea Moneta 4
1.2 The World of Cypraea Annulus 4
2.1 The Maldives 21
2.2 The Maldives and Its World 32
3.1 India and the Maldives 44
3.2 The Bay of Bengal 47
4.1 The Tai World (c. Fourteenth Century) 76
5.1 Yunnan Province of the Fifteenth Century 113
6.1 Archaeological Discoveries of Cowrie Shells in Neolithic China
(Pre-Thirteenth Century BCE) 130
6.2 Archaeological Discoveries of Cowrie Shells in Shang-Zhou China
(c. Twelfth Century BCE to Sixth Century BCE) 131
6.3 Archaeological Discoveries of Cowrie Shells in Warring-State China
(c. Fifth Century BCE to Third Century BCE) 132
6.4 The Chu Kingdom (c. Third Century BCE) 144
7.1 West Africa 166
10.1 The Cowrie Money World I: Pre-Ninth Century 260
10.2 The Cowrie Money World II: Tenth to Thirteenth Centuries 261
10.3 The Cowrie Money World III: Fourteenth to Mid-Seventeenth
Centuries 262
10.4 The Cowrie Money World IV: Late Seventeenth to Nineteenth
Centuries 263
