The shell money of the slave trade
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The shell money of the slave trade
(African studies series, 49)
Cambridge University Press, 1986
Available at 20 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Bibliography: p. 202-218
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
This study examines the role of cowrie-shell money in West African trade, particularly the slave trade. The shells were carried from the Maldives to the Mediterranean by Arab traders for further transport across the Sahara, and to Europe by competing Portuguese, Dutch, English and French traders for onward transport to the West African coast. In Africa they served to purchase the slaves exported to the New World, as well as other less sinister exports. Over a large part of West Africa they became the regular market currency, but were severely devalued by the importation of thousands of tons of the cheaper Zanzibar cowries. Colonial governments disliked cowries because of the inflation and encouraged their replacement by low-value coins. They disappeared almost totally, to re-appear during the depression of the 1930s, and have been found occasionally in the markets of remote frontier districts, avoiding exchange and currency control problems.
Table of Contents
- Maps
- Tables and chart
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1. The cowrie
- 2. The Maldive Islands
- 3. The Portuguese domination
- 4. The Dutch and English enter the trade (seventeenth century)
- 5. Prosperity for the cowrie commerce (eighteenth century)
- 6. Boom and slump for the cowrie trade (nineteenth century)
- 7. Collection, transport and distribution
- 8. Cowries in Africa
- 9. The cowrie as money: transport costs, values and inflation
- 10. The last of the cowrie
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index.
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