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8 American Seashells
Another Money Cowrie was unearthed near the so-called Onatonabee Ser-
pent Mound of Peterboro County in Ontario, Canada. It is most hkely that
in both of these cases the shells were the remnants of the Hudson's Bay Com-
pany's shell stock which was bartered with the Cree and other Indians well
before the time of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
A hvely trade in marine shells took place for centuries among the pre-
Columbian peoples of southwestern United States. Archaeological studies in
that area have been able to confirm the existence of trade routes which then
existed from three principal geographical areas, one along the coast of southem
California, a second from the Gulf of California, and the third on the
Atlantic side from the coast of the Gulf of Mexico.
Figure 2. Major sources of trade shells used by the early American Indians.
a, tusk-shells. Dentalium, used for money; b, abalone shells, Haliotis, and the neck-
lace shells, Olivella; c, Glycymeris clams for bracelets; d, olive shells, helmet shells,
Cassis, and many others; e, large whelks, Biisyco?i, and Venus clams; f, wampum
from the Venus clam, Mercenaria mercenaria.
Marine shells were used primarily as ornaments. Beads of glossy
Olivellas and Olive shells were by far the most popular throughout the esti-
mated 1000-year span of trading. Pendants, bracelets, rattles, trumpets and
carved shells were popular in that order. Pacific Coast shells were passed on
from settlement to settlement to a limited extent by the early Basket Makers
(?-50o A.D.) and, with the rise of the late Basket Makers (500-700 A.D.),
trading increased from both the Pacific Coast and the Gulf of California.