1 66 Shells as evidence of tlie Migrations. 



again (p. 90) in speaking of the standard of money 

 in India from Alexander the Great to the Mahommedan 

 Conquest, he says : " In Northern India the copper pieces 

 were supplemented by gold and silver multipliers, in 

 Southern India by dividers of cowrie-shells." In the 

 Aianikyala tope in the Punjab, opened in 1830, "were 

 found mingled together cowrie shells, gold coins of the 

 Kadphises and Kanerkes, Roman consular coins shortly 

 before the Christian era, and copper coins of the Sassanian 

 line.'' 1 -" Cowries formed the bulk of the currency between 

 the beginning of the Christian era and the Mahommedan 

 dynasty of A.D. I2O3. 1 ' 27 I" Bengal the system of a copper 

 standard with cowry dividers and gold and silver multi- 

 pliers remained unchanged after the Mahommedan Con- 

 quest. Ibn Batuta, the Arabian traveller of the 1 4th century, 

 gives an account of the collection of the cowry-shells in 

 the Maldive islands, from whence they were exported to 

 Bengal in exchange for rice. He states that a bustns 

 equalled a lak of cowries, and four l^ks, or four bnstus, were 

 estimated as worth one gold dinar, but the rate of exchange 

 was so variable that occasionally a dinar would purchase 

 as many as twelve laks of cowries. 128 



In Orissa, the next kingdom south of Bengal, accounts 

 were kept in cowries, and the following scale of values 

 prevailed during the early part of the Mahommedan rule : 

 4 cowries = i gunda ; 5 gundas= i boory ; 4 boories=i 

 pun ; 1 6 20 puns= i khawun ; 10 khawuns= i rupee. In 

 1740, a rupee exchanged for 2,400 cowries; in 1/56, for 



R Marsden, "Numismata Orientalia," edited by Edward Thomas. 

 London, 1874, quoted by Del Mar, op, cit., p. 86 footnote. 



1 -~ Marsden, op. cit., p. 37 ; Del Mar, op. ctt., p. 90 footnote. 



128 Del Mar, op. cit., p. 99; ICdward Thomas, "The Chronicles of 

 ihe Pathan Ivings of Delhi," London, 1871, p. no footnote. In Lee's 

 translation of "Ibn Batuta" (London, 1829, pp. 179 & 181) the cowry 

 (Wada) is referred to as alms-gifts and as currency in the Maldives. 



