Chapter COWRY of C by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

at the rate of 4 bustu for a gold dinar. [This would be about 40,000 for a rupee.] Sometimes the rate falls, and 12 bustu are exchanged for a gold dinar. The islanders barter them to the people of Bengal for rice, for they also form the currency in use in that country.…These cowries serve also for barter with the negroes in their own land. I have seen them sold at Mali and Gugu [on the Niger] at the rate of 1150 for a gold dinar.”—Ibn Batuta, iv. 122.

c. 1420.—“A man on whom I could rely assured me that he saw the people of one of the chief towns of the Said employ as currency, in the purchase of low-priced articles of provision, kaudas, which in Egypt are known as wada, just as people in Egypt use fals.”—Makrizi, S. de Sacy, Chrest. Arabe, 2nd ed. i. 252.

[1510.—Mr. Whiteway writes: “In an abstract of an unpublished letter of Alboquerque which was written about 1510, and abstracted in the following year, occurs this sentence:—‘The merchandize which they carry from Cairo consists of snails (caracoes) of the Twelve Thousand Islands.’ He is speaking of the internal caravan-trade of Africa, and these snails must be cowries.”]

1554.—At the Maldives: “Cowries 12,000 make one cota; and 4½ cotas of average size weigh one quintal; the big ones something more.”—A. Nunes, 35.

„ “In these isles…are certain white little shells which they call cauris.”—Castanheda, iv. 7.

1561.—“Which vessels (Gundras, or palm-wood boats from the Maldives) come loaded with coir and caury, which are certain little white shells found among the Islands in such abundance that whole vessels are laden with them, and which make a great trade in Bengala, where they are current as money.”—Correa, I. i. 341.

1586.—“In Bengal are current those little shells that are found in the islands of Maldiva, called here courim, and in Portugal Buzio.”—Sassetti, in De Gubernatis, 205.

[c. 1590.—“Four kos from this is a well, into which if the bone of any animal be thrown it petrifies, like a cowrie shell, only smaller.”—Ain, ed. Jarrett, ii. 229.]

c. 1610.—“Les marchandises qu’ils portent le plus souvent sont ces petites coquilles des Maldives, dont ils chargent tous les ans grand nombre de nauires. Ceux des Maldives les appellent Boly, et les autres Indiens Caury.”—Pyrard de Laval, i. 517; see also p. 165; [Hak. Soc. i. 438; also comp. i. 78, 157, 228, 236, 240, 250, 299; Boly is Singh. bella, a cowry].

c. 1664.—“…lastly, it (Indostan) wants those little Sea- cockles of the Maldives, which serve for common Coyne in Bengale, and in some other places:…”—Bernier, E.T. 63; [ed. Constable, 204].

[c. 1665.—“The other small money consists of shells called Cowries, which have the edges inverted, and they are not found in any other part of the world save only the Maldive Islands.…Close to the sea they give up to 80 for the paisa, and that diminishes as you leave the sea, on account of carriage; so that at Agra you receive but 50 or 55 for the paisa.”—Tavernier, ed. Ball, i. 27 seq.]

1672.—“Cowreys, like sea-shells, come from Siam, and the Philippine Islands.”—Fryer, 86.

1683.—“The Ship Britannia—from the Maldiva Islands, arrived before the Factory…at their first going ashore, their first salutation from the natives was a shower of Stones and Arrows, whereby 6 of their Men were wounded, which made them immediately return on board, and by ye mouths of their Guns forced them to a complyance, and permission to load what Cowries they would at Markett Price; so that in a few days time they sett sayle from thence for Surrat with above 60 Tunn of Cowryes.”—Hedges, Diary, July 1; [Hak. Soc. i. 96].

1705.—“…Coris, qui sont des petits coquillages.”—Luillier, 245.

1727.—“The Couries are caught by putting Branches of Cocoa-nut trees with their Leaves on, into the Sea, and in five or six Months the little Shell-fish stick to those leaves in Clusters, which they take off, and digging Pits in the Sand, put them in and cover them up, and leave them two or three Years in the Pit, that the Fish may putrefy, and then they take them out of the Pit, and barter them for Rice, Butter, and Cloth, which Shipping bring from Ballasore in Orisa near Bengal, in which Countries Couries pass for Money from 2500 to 3000 for a Rupee, or half a Crown English.”—A. Hamilton [ed. 1744], i. 349.

1747.—“Formerly 12,000 weight of these cowries would purchase a cargo of five or six hundred Negroes: but those lucrative times are now no more; and the Negroes now set such a value on their countrymen, that there is no such thing as having a cargo under 12 or 14 tuns of cowries.

“As payments of this kind of specie are attended with some intricacy, the Negroes, though so simple as to sell one another for shells, have contrived a kind of copper vessel, holding exactly 108 pounds, which is a great dispatch to business.”—A Voyage to the Id. of Ceylon on board a Dutch Indiaman in the year 1747, &c. &c. Written by a Dutch Gentleman. Transl. &c. London, 1754, pp.21 seq.

1749.—“The only Trade they deal in is Cowries (or Blackamoor’s Teeth as they call them in England), the King’s sole Property, which the sea throws up in great abundance.”—The Boscawen’s Voyage to Bombay, by Philalethes (1750), p. 52.

1753.—“Our Hon’ble Masters having expressly directed ten tons of couries to be laden in each of their ships homeward bound, we ordered the Secretary to prepare a protest against Captain Cooke for refusing to take any on board the Admiral