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In China, cowries were so important that many characters relating to money or trade contain the character for cowry: 貝. Starting over three thousand years ago, cowry shells, or copies of the shells, were used as Chinese currency. [11] The Classical Chinese character radical for "money/currency", 貝, originated as a pictograph of a cowrie ...
Before the Spring and Autumn period, during the Shang dynasty, cowrie shells had been used as an early type of money. In the Zhou period, their use became more stylised with replica shells made of porcelain, jade or metal coming into use. Some sources suggest that early round coins were a highly stylised representation of the cowrie shells. [1] [2]
Inscriptions and archaeological evidence shows that cowrie shells were regarded as important objects of value in the Shang dynasty (c. 1766 – 1154 BC). In the Zhou period, they are frequently referred to as gifts or rewards from kings and nobles to their subjects.
1742 drawing of shells of the money cowrie, Monetaria moneta Cowrie shells The shells of cowries are usually smooth and shiny and more or less egg-shaped. The round side of the shell is called the Dorsal Face, whereas the flat under side is called the Ventral Face, which shows a long, narrow, slit-like opening (), which is often toothed at the edges.
However, copies of cowry shells made out of bone, wood, stone, lead and copper were common enough to presume that they were used in trade. Chinese shell money, 16–8th century BCE. The Chinese may have invented the first metal coins, coins found in Anyang date to before 900 BC. [1] [2] [better source needed] At that time, the coin itself was a ...
Burial money was modeled after the many different types of ancient Chinese coinages, and earlier forms of burial money tended to be actual money. [5] Graves that were dated to the Shang dynasty period have been discovered that contain thousands of cowrie shells, for example, the Fu Hao-mu, dating to about the year 1200 BCE, was discovered containing 6,900 cowry shells. [8]
Monetaria moneta, common name the money cowrie, is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Cypraeidae, the cowries. [1]This species is called "money cowrie" because the shells were historically widely used in many Pacific and Indian Ocean countries as shell money before coinage was in common usage.
Bronze cowrie container, Western Han Dynasty (202 BC - 9 AD), Yunnan Provincial Museum, Kunming; cowrie shells were used as an early form of money in this region of China and were kept in elaborately decorated bronze containers such as this one, surmounted by a freestanding gilded horseman who is encircled by four oxen, that are approached in ...