1 50 Shells as evidence of the Migrations. 



{op. cit., iii., p. 83, fig. i.), also gives an illustration of a 

 Beneki fetish with cowry-eyes, which has a strong resem- 

 blance to the Bavili example. 



In the Cameroon district the use of cowries as currency 

 seems to have ceased, but the shells are applied as orna- 

 ment. Zintgraff writes that in Adamawa and the frontier- 

 land such was the case. The Bali warriors were allowed 

 to carry a bandolier upon which the cowries were sewn in 

 two rows, the channelled opening of the shell being to the 

 outside. They were also seen arranged in cross-form on 

 a small, flat, cloth packet, which was worn on a string 

 from the neck, resembling the amulet which the Mahom- 

 medan wears. Another interesting use noted by Zint- 

 graff is that by the chief of the Bafut, living on the 

 Adamawa frontier, who had utilized cowries as a sort of 

 mosaic on the floor of his spacious palm-wine hall."* The 

 shells are also worked into the coiffure of the women in 

 the Cameroons, as many as two hundred being required."* 



We now reach the chief zone of circulation of the 

 cowry — the western Sudan and Guinea coast. For many 

 centuries the shells have passed as a means of currency 

 throughout the greater part of this region, and in many 

 places they have also played an important part in religious 

 and other ceremonies. 



Our earliest knowledge of their employment in this 

 region as currency dates from the 14th century, when the 

 Arab traveller Ibn Batuta saw them in use for transacting 

 business at Kawkaw (Gao or Gagho) on the Niger.'* 

 Cadamosto, who visited Cape Verde in 1455, also noted 

 the white shells, " porcellete or cowries," used in exchange 



"^ Schneider, op. ciL, p. 171. 



"' Joyce and others, " Women of all Nations," p. 351. 



»* "The Travels of Ibn Battlla," translated by the Rev. Samuel Lee, 

 London, 1829, p. 241. 



