Use of Cowry -shells for Currency, Amulets, etc. i6i 



are also despatched to the dead in the same way. Slaves 

 or prisoners taken in war are richly dressed and laden 

 with cowries, and when they become intoxicated by rum 

 they are slain. In this manner it is believed that not 

 only messages, but the circulating medium with which 

 the victims are laden, can be conveyed to the departed 

 relatives of the people who have performed this pious 

 sacrifice. With these people sixteen appears to be a 

 sacred and mystical number. Thus, for instance, when 

 meditating war the war priest throws into the air sixteen 

 cowries. Much depends upon the way these fall. Those 

 which fall with the aperture upwards portend peace ; but 

 if a greater number fall with their apertures downwards, 

 then the divination is considered to be favourable to war. 



Some interesting details of the use of the cowry as a 

 medium for the transmission of messages are given by 

 the Rev. C. A. Gollmer in his paper on " African Symbolic 

 Messages.""" In the Yoruba country, he informs us, the 

 natives send messages to each other by means of shells, 

 feathers, corn, stone, coal, etc., through which they convey 

 their ideas, feelings, and wishes, good or bad. Cowry- 

 shells in the symbolic language are used to convey, by their 

 number and the way in which they are strung, a variety of 

 ideas. Thus one cowry, strung on a short bit of grass 

 fibre, or cord, may indicate " defiance and failure " ; two 

 cowries, if strung face to face, "relationship and meeting," 

 but if strung back to back, " separation and enmity " ; 

 two cowries and a feather, " speedy meeting " ; three 

 cowries, with their faces all looking one way, strung with 

 an alligator pepper, " deceit " ; six cowries may indicate 

 " attachment and affection." 



According to Bloxam,™ cowries are similarly em- 



"' Journ. Anilirop. Inst, Gt. Bn. and I., vol. xiv,, p. 169. 

 ^'' Ibid., vol. .\vi. , p. 295. 



