cowrie (Other Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Barbara Heath.

Cowrie shells (Cypraea moneta and Cypraea annulus) have been found in historic contexts associated with African enslavement on New World sites in the Caribbean, the American South, the Middle Atlantic, and the Northeast. Historical archaeologists have come to see these tiny shells as generally indicative of African presence and as specific evidence of spirituality at the sites where they are recovered. In this paper, I examine the role of cowrie shells in the global economies of the 17th, 18th,...