ORIGIN OF AMERICAN SHELL-MONEY. 229 



22, 1882, p. 524) says that in that group the regular currency consists of 

 native beads, red and white, called makira (Makira being a large bay and 

 district at San Christoval), and maldyta money, the latter a kind much 

 smaller than the former. Makira money is not unlike the segment of the 

 backbone of a small fish, and'is made from small shells ground to proper 

 size and smothness ; the making of this, a slow process, is the employment 

 of the women, who, after its manufacture, string it together by the hole 

 which exists in the centre. For small change they use the teeth of the 

 dog and the flying-fox (Pteropus), two of the former and four of the 

 latter equalling one makira. 



This approaches nearer than does the cowry currency to the charac- 

 ter of the American shell-money of the eastern coast ; for, whereas all that 

 was required to turn a cowry into a coin was to find it and punch a small 

 hole in it, both makira and wampum were a distinct advance upon this, 

 since they were manufactured articles. In addition to the exertion of 

 securing the rnollusk's shell, there was a large expenditure of labor 

 in fashioning the bead which acted as a coin. Lindstrom, a Swedish 

 engineer, says (in Smith's "History of New Jersey") that an Indian's 

 utmost manufacture amounted only to a few pence a day ; and all writers 

 enlarge upon the great labor and patience needed to make it, especially 

 at the South. Hence the purchasing power of a wampum bead was far 

 in advance of that of a cowry, a dentalium of the Pacific coast, or any 

 other unwrought shell used as money. 



The origin of American shell-money may be taken to have been some- 

 what as follows: Shells, by their pretty shape and bright colors, attracted 

 the eye of the savage, who, finding them easy to suspend about his cloth- 

 ing, employed them as ornaments. Only those tribes living on the 

 shores of the ocean could obtain these shells ; but finding them coveted 

 by natives of the interior, exchanges would quickly spring up. Koger 

 Williams says distinctly that among the trades pursued by different mem- 

 bers of the Narraganset tribe, those along the coast " made money " as 

 a regular and profitable occupation. The' longer this continued, and the 

 more frequently it occurred, the nearer the shells came to being money 

 as well as ornaments. In Iroquois myths Hiawatha introduced the use 

 of wampum by stringing small white shells which he found on the 

 shores of one of the northern lakes ; but this was for ceremonial purposes, 

 not as money (Hale, "Iroquois Book of Kites," p. 23). Small fresh-water 

 shells, suitable for stringing and unfitted to ornamental purposes, are 

 found plentifully in mounds and graves in the Mississippi Valley, and 

 many archaeologists believe that these were employed as the currency of 



