Introduction. P Xiil 
sprung out of the fanciful resemblance which a particular 
group of primitive men imagined they could detect between 
the cowry and the female organs of reproduction. 
In his remarkable work “D’Amboinsche Rariteit- 
kamer,” published in Amsterdam in 1741, Rumphius 
informs his readers that the cowry was referred to by 
d 
Ennius under the name “matriculus ”; and he explains the 
meaning of this expression thus :—“ Apud utorsque nomen - 
accepterunt a similitudine pudendi muliebris, quod Greci 
Chaeron, Latini porcum et porculum vocant, cujus aliquam 
similitudinem refert hujus Conchaerina” (II Boek, p. 113). 
Twenty-one years later Adanson, in his “ Histoire natur- 
elie) du sencoal, * referring to the use of the terms 
“Pucelage” and “Concha Venerea,” says :—“ Concha 
Venerea sic dicta quia partem foemineam quodam modo 
repraesentat: externe quidem per labiorum fissuram, 
interne vero propter cavitatem uterum mentientem 
Sunto igitur dictae Porcellanae (id est Venereae) ob 
aliquam cum pudendo muliebri similitudinem.” Aldrov. 
Exang., p. 552. These ideas are still current in Japan at 
the present day.’ 
That such fancied resemblances were really regarded 
so seriously in ancient times as to confer vital powers 
upon the simulating object has just been claimed for the 
mandrake by Dr. Rendel Harris. He refers the origin 
of this association to Cyprus, which also gave the cowry 
its scientific name, Cyprzea ; and in attributing the origin 
of the cult of Aphrodite to the magical fertilising property 
of the anthropoid mandrake (when worn against the flesh 
2 “Coquillages,” p. 65—Paris, 1762. 
3.W. L. Hildburgh, ‘‘Some Japanese Charms connected with the 
making of Clothing,” A/an, Feb., 1917, p. 28. (See the Appendix of this 
book, p. 205). 
4“ The Origin of the Cult of Aphrodite,” Manchester, 1916, republished 
in his ‘‘ Ascent of Olympus,” 1917. 
