312 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887. 



by them were received indirectly from the maritime or coast tribes in 

 exchange for such articles as were peculiar to their interior position. 



Without multiplying authorities, it may be safely asserted that this 

 shell money was manufactured along the Atlantic coast from Maine to 

 Florida, and on the Gulf coast certainly as far south as Central America. 

 The use of this circulating medium was undo ubtedly very general among 

 the agricultural tribes east of the Mississippi River.* The ancient 

 sepulchral tumuli of Georgia, Tennessee, Florida, and other Southern 

 States, as well as those located in the valley of the Ohio and in valleys 

 tributary both to it and to the Mississippi from the east, when opened, 

 fully corroborate the historical narrative, and afford physical proof that 

 this product of the skill and the patience of the eoast tribes, sought 

 and obtained through trade relations, was thus, and by means of subse- 

 quent migrations, widely disseminated among the red men dwelling far 

 in the interior. 



The proximity of the coast tribes to the sources whence the material 

 was procured from which the wampum-peage was made would at once 

 give to the latter superior commercial advantages, and it is quite likely 

 that they were directly or indirectly liberal purchasers from the interior 

 communities, who considered them, if not as merchants or bankers, at 

 least as particularly fortunate and wealthy on account of the money 

 they handled, just as the inhabitants of interior aud agricultural dis- 

 tricts among civilized people regard the traders and inhabitants of lit- 

 toral cities and settlements. 



There is some reason for believing that among the Five Nations wam- 

 pum of home manufacture was made out of a species of fresh- water 

 snail (shell) that lives in the streams and smaller lakes of the region 

 occupied by said tribes. 



From the foregoing some idea may be formed of the importance in 

 the past of 



SHELL MONEY AS A FACTOR IN AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. 



Aside from the shell beads, or strings of shell beads, that were used 

 as money, wampum was used for personal adornment,t and belts were 

 made by embroidering wampum upon " strips of deer-skin," forming a 

 girdle or scarf, and these belts and scarfs were not simply an evidence 

 of wealth but a symbol of authority and power. 



* C. C. Jones, Antiquities of the Southern Indians. Appleton & Co., 1873. 



t " The Queen of Painunkey was introduced * * * she having round her head 

 a plat of black and white wampum peague three inches broad in imitation of a 

 corown, and was cloathed in a mantle of dresst deer skins," etc. T[homas] Mat- 

 thews] The Begining and Progress and Conclusion of Bacon's Rebellion in Virginia 

 in the year 1675 and 1G7G. 



"Their hair was breeded with white and Blue Peak, and hung gracefully upon a 

 large Roll upon their shoulders. This peak consists of small cylinders cut out of a 

 Conqne shell, drilled through and strung like Beads. It serves them both for Money 

 aud Jewels, the Blue being of much greater Value than the white." [Byrd, 1. c. 73.] 



