844 Aboriginal Shell Money. [June, 
ABORIGINAL SHELL MONEY. 
: BY ROBERT E. C. STEARNS. 
F several articles heretofore published,! I have written on the 
use of various species of shells for the purposes of money by 
the aborigines of North America, and have also briefly referred 
to the use of the same class of material for similar purposes in 
Africa and India, and the antiquity of shell money in the latter 
country. 
Since the date of my last paper additional data have been ac- 
quired, which are worthy of note as they relate to certain West 
American species of mollusks not before enumerated, the shells 
of which have been and to some extent are still used for money 
by some of the Indian tribes in California. 
The discovery of a species of Olivella (0. bipli- 
cata Sby.) in ancient graves on San Miguel Island 
\ (one of a cluster of islands thirty miles westerly) off 
‘\ the southerly coast of this State was referred to in a 
4 ia previous paper. I have since examined specimens 
J f: | of the same species, found by Mr. C. D. Voy in a 
“} burial mound near Vallejo, in Solano County, in the 
year 1872, now in the museum of the University of 
California, which also contains much rare and inter- 
esting prehistoric material collected by the same 
person in various parts of the State. Of this species about two 
hundred specimens were obtained from the Vallejo mound, as 
well as human remains and numerous aboriginal relics, such as 
stone pipes, bone whistles, and arrowheads, also another form of 
shell money and ornament described further on. 
In all of the Olivellas from the Vallejo mound, the upper part 
of the spire or the apex of each shell has been ground off in the 
same manner as in the San Miguel Island specimens,” and it 1s 
presumed that they were formerly strung and worn as a necklace, 
an ornament for which these shells are still used by some of the 
interior Indians of Central California, as I have been informed by 
Mr. Stephen Powers, a most excellent authority. He says that 
this form is now used for personal adornment by the Bear River 
Indians, and is by them called “ colco a” Referring to the shells 
he writes, “ They are strung double, that is, two strings of them 
1 American Naturalist, March, 1869; Overland Monthly, April, 1873 ; Pr oceedings 
of the California Academy of Sciences, July, 1873. 
2 Collected by Mr. W. G. W. Harford. 
(Fie. 62.) OLI- 
VELLA BIPLI- 
