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⁶² Hiskett, M., op. cit.Google Scholar This theory seems to have originated with Jackson, W., Shells as Evidence of the Migration of Early Culture (Manchester, 1916), and is based on a carefully constructed distribution map—a warning to archaeologists and others who draw conclusions from distribution maps.Google Scholar

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⁶⁴ Julien, Ch.-A., Histoire de l'Afrique du nord (Paris, 1961), 234. The English were importing to Morocco in ca. 1700: ‘Guinea cowries, which are shells serving as money in that country.’Google Scholar

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⁶⁶ Commodore Stewart quoted by Thomas, Winterbottom, An account of the native Africans in Sierra Leone (London, 1803), 221: ‘The goods they [the Moroccans] bring to Guinea are salt, cowries etc.’Google Scholar (quoted in Schneider, O., op. cit.).Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Hiskett, , op. cit. 355. Lucas, from North Africa, at the end of the eighteenth century, believed that merchants at Katsina obtained cowries from the countries nearer the sea (Association for Promoting the Discovery of the Interior Parts of Africa, Proceedings, I, 105ff;Google ScholarHallett, R., Records of the African Association 167, 186).Google Scholar See also Daumas, E., Le Grand Désert: Itinéraire d'une caravane du Sahara au pays des nègres (Paris, 1848), 241: ‘Cowries, they tell me, come from the Bahar el Nil (Niger), which runs ten days’ journey west of Katsina. The sultan has organized a system of customs posts which prevent individuals from bringing them from the interior without paying enormous duties. He has the monopoly.’Google Scholar

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⁷⁰ ‘George, Dobson’, ‘The River Volta, Gold Coast, West Africa’, J. Manchester Geog. Soc., VIII (1892), 21:Google Scholar ‘a canoe 25ft. long by 3 ft. wide and 18 ins, deep requiring eight men to pole it up’ (for the identity of ‘George Dobson’ see note in my ‘M. Bonnat on the Volta’, Ghana Notes and Queries, no. 10 (1968), 6).Google Scholar

⁷¹ Dupuis, J., Journal of a Residence in Ashantee (London, 1924), CXIV.Google Scholar

⁷² Herz, J. E., op. cit. 23, quoting R. Burton.Google Scholar

⁷³ Shabeeny, quoted in Jackson, J. G., An Account of Timbuctoo and Hausa (London, 1820), 2: 4–5 quintals;Google ScholarDenham, and Clapperton, , Narrative of Travels and Discovery in North and Central Africa. (1822–1824): 4 cwt.;Google ScholarCaillié, R., Journal d'un voyage à Temboutou et a Jenné (Paris, 1830), 67: 500 lb.;Google ScholarDickson, C. H., ‘Account of Ghadames’, J. Royal Geog. Soc. 1860: cwt.;Google ScholarRabbi, Mordekkai, ‘Reisen nach Timbuktu’, Petermanns Mitteilungen, 1870: not over 150 kg.;Google ScholarOllive, Dr, ‘Schilderung von Tendouf’, Petermanns Mitteilungen, 1880: 3 centner; Col. Mircher ca. 1865Google Scholar (in Newbury, C. W., ‘North Africa and Western Sudan trade in the nineteenth century, a re-evaluation’, J. Afr. Hist. VII (1966), 233): 3 kantar = 150 kg.;CrossRefGoogle ScholarMiège, J. L., Le Maroc et l'Europe, III, (Paris, 1961–1962); 85 ff.: 3 quintals = 154–162 kg.;Google Scholaribid. 258: 150kg.; Lugard, F., in Annual Report, Northern Nigeria 1902: 3–4½ cwt.Google Scholar

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⁷⁷ Monteil, P. L., De Saint Louis à Tripoli (Paris, 1895), 282. This value agrees approximately with Barth's estimate that a donkey carried 5,000–6,000 kola nutsGoogle Scholar (Barth, , op. cit. v, 29).Google Scholar

⁷⁸ Lugard, F., Diaries, ed. Perham, M. and Bull, M., IV (London, 1963), 120. See also page 117: ‘It is these donkeys that throw everything out. Four more were dying this morning, and had to be left, and one yesterday = 10 loads.’Google Scholar

⁷⁹ Mischlich to German Government, Akte 3832, of 20 Mar. 1903, p. 44, in German Colonial Archives at Potsdam (I am indebted to Dr I. Sellnow for this reference). Mischlich describes 3,000 kola as a ‘fairly heavy donkey load’. This is 1½ times the standard headload of 2,000 kola weighing about 65 lb.

⁸⁰ Polly Hill pointed out to me that merchants could also be farmers, in which case the donkeys were bred on the farm. If the Mossi donkeys used in the Mossi–Salaga–Hausa caravan trade were larger and stronger than the southern donkeys, or the farm-bred donkeys of Hausland, this would account for the higher prices, and the Hausa merchants’ preference for Mossi donkeys.

⁸¹ Barth, H., op. cit. V, 29.Google Scholar

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⁸⁵ Dupuis, J., op. cit. CXIV. These caravans were in fact mixed donkey and slave porter, in varying proportions; costs were probably similar for both.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Meredith, H., An Account of the Gold Coast of West Africa (London, 1812), 183.Google Scholar

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⁹² Beaufoy quoted in Hallett, Records of the African Association. Mattra, in 1793, also stated that there was no money in circulation but gold dust and shells (ibid. 118).

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¹⁰⁴ Binger, L. C., op. cit. I, 498 ff.Google ScholarKlose, H., Togo unter deutschem Flagge (Berlin, 1899), 362 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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¹⁰⁶ Klose, H., op. cit. 362 ff.Google Scholar See also David Asante's diary of 1884 edited by Christaller, , ‘Journey to Salaga and Obooso’, Mitteilungen Geog. Gesellschaft zu Bern, 1886.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ Barth, H., op. cit. III, 202.Google Scholar

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¹⁰⁹ Ryder, A. F. C., loc. cit. 301 ff.Google Scholar

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¹⁹⁰ I should like to acknowledge the facilities made available to me at the Institute of African Studies, Legon, by courtesy of Mr Thomas Hodgkin; Professor Ivor Wilks has given me most generous help and encouragement with this study; and I must also thank the large number of people who have taken the trouble to give me information and references about cowries.