Wampum - WikiHQ

thumb|300px|right|Quahog (left) and whelk (right) wampum

thumb|right|A representation of the original [[Two Row Wampum Treaty|Two Row Wampum treaty belt]]

thumb|Modern examples and interpretations of wampum

thumb|right|[[Haudenosaunee wampum belt]]

Wampum is a traditional shell bead of the Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands of North America. The term first referred to white and purple beads made from the quahog, also known as the Western North Atlantic hard-shelled clam, but has expanded to include white shell beads hand-fashioned from the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell.

In New York, wampum beads have been discovered dating from before 1510. Before European contact, strings of wampum were used for storytelling, ceremonial gifts, and recording important treaties and historical events, such as the Two Row Wampum Treaty and the Hiawatha Belt.

Northeastern Indigenous tribes also used wampum as a means of exchange, strung together in lengths for convenience. The process to make wampum was labor-intensive with stone tools. The coastal tribes had sufficient access to the basic shells to make wampum. These factors increased its scarcity and consequent value among the early European traders, who understood it as a currency and adopted it as such in trading with them.

Wampum artists continue to weave belts of a historical nature, as well as designing new belts or jewelry based on their own concepts. The Proto-Algonquian reconstructed form is thought to be (wa·p-a·py-aki), "white strings".

The term wampum (or wampumpeag) initially referred only to the white beads which are made of the inner spiral or columella of the channeled whelk shell Busycotypus canaliculatus or Busycotypus carica. Sewant or zeewant was the term used for this currency by the New Netherland colonists. Common terms for the dark and white beads are wampi (white and yellowish) and saki (dark). The Lenape name for Long Island is Sewanacky, reflecting its connection to the dark wampum.

Description and manufacture

thumb|right|The white beads are made from the inner spiral of the channeled whelk shell.

Wampum beads are typically tubular in shape, often a quarter of an inch long and an eighth of an inch wide. One 17th-century Seneca wampum belt featured beads almost 2.5 inches (65 mm) long.

The introduction of European metal tools revolutionized the production of wampum, and by the mid-seventeenth century, production numbered in the tens of millions of beads. Dutch colonists discovered the importance of wampum as a means of exchange between tribes, and they began mass-producing it in workshops. John Campbell established such a factory in Passaic, New Jersey, which manufactured wampum into the early 20th century.</blockquote>

Wampum belts were used as a memory aid in oral tradition, and were sometimes used as badges of office or as ceremonial devices in Indigenous cultures, such as the Iroquois. For example, the 1820 New Monthly Magazine reports on a speech given by the late chief Tecumseh in which he vehemently gesticulated to a belt as he pointed out treaties made 20 years earlier and battles fought since then.

thumb|right|Iroquois Chiefs from the Six Nations Reserve reading Wampum belts in Brantford, Ontario, in 1871

Wampum strings may be presented as a formal affirmation of cooperation or friendship between groups, or as an invitation to a meeting. In his study on the origins of money, anthropologist David Graeber placed wampum as it was used by indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands before European colonization in a category of things with symbolic cultural value that were "mainly used to rearrange relations between people" rather than being used in exchanges of everyday items.

The Iroquois used wampum as a person's credentials or a certificate of authority. It was also used for official purposes and religious ceremonies, and as a way to bind peace between tribes. Among the Iroquois, every chief and every clan mother has a certain string of wampum that serves as their certificate of office. When they pass on or are removed from their station, the string will then pass on to the new leader. Runners carrying messages during colonial times would present the wampum showing that they had the authority to carry the message.

As a method of recording and an aid in narrating, Iroquois warriors with exceptional skills were provided training in interpreting the wampum belts. As the Keepers of the Central Fire, the Onondaga Nation was also trusted with the task of keeping all wampum records. Wampum is still used in the ceremony of raising up a new chief and in the Iroquois Thanksgiving ceremonies.

<blockquote>... the Iroquoians (Five Nations and Huron alike) shared a very particular constitution: they saw their societies not as a collection of living individuals but as a collection of eternal names, which over the course of times passed from one individual holder to another. The black shells were rarer than the white shells and so were worth more, which led people to dye the white and dilute the value of black shells.

In the writings of Robert Beverley Jr. of Virginia Colony about tribes in Virginia in 1705, he described peak as referring to the white shell bead, valued at 9 pence a yard, and wampom peak as denoting the more expensive dark purple shell bead, at the rate of 1 shilling and 6 pence (18 pence) per yard. He added that these polished shells with drilled holes were made from the cunk (conch), while another currency of lesser value called was fashioned from the cockleshell.

Wampum briefly became legal tender in North Carolina in 1710, but its use as common currency died out in New York by the early 18th century.

The use of wampum as currency spans back to 1622, when the Dutch implemented it into their trade. After the introduction of wampum into European currency, the European colonists quickly began trying to amass large quantities of this currency, and shifting control of this currency determined which power would have control of the European-Indigenous trade. The wampum's significance to the tribes that collected it meant that no one individual wanted to amass too much of it, however, European colonists did not care about its cultural significance, but it would always hold value to the indigenous populations. In this way, colonists could trade wampum for goods and sell those goods to Europeans for European currencies, therefore amassing wealth. This is one of the few examples of settler adaptation of indigenous practices for trade with indigenous people and also amongst themselves. However, the conversion of wampum to European currencies and the introduction of a monetary system was not something that the indigenous people had a desire to take part in, thus increasing tensions as trades held different economic value to each contributing party. However, when wampum was legal tender, it was one of the most important forms of currency in the region amongst settlers as well as between settlers and indigenous groups.

Mass production and mechanization

As early as the late 16th century, some shell beads from modern day New York showed signs of metal tool work. By the end of the 17th century, virtually all new wampum was produced using metal tools, and by the 18th century, glass beads had become predominant. The increased availability of wampum was linked to mass production efforts by Long Island Algonquians, who utilized metal tools obtained from Europeans to produce large quantities of beads for trade.

In the 18th century, Dutch colonists in the Hudson Valley established small-scale wampum manufacturing operations to supplement scarce coinage and facilitate trade.

The mass production and European involvement in wampum manufacturing contributed to widespread circulation but eventual devaluation. By the 19th century, glass paste beads produced in European workshops added to the confusion and effectively led to the disappearance of older, traditional wampum as a medium of exchange.

Repatriation

In 1989, the National Museum of the American Indian repatriated eleven wampum belts to Haudenosaunee chiefs at the Onondaga Longhouse Six Nations Reserve in New York. These belts dated to the late 18th century and are sacred to the Longhouse religion. They had been away from their tribes for over a century.

In 2017, a wampum belt purchased by Frank Speck in 1913 was returned to Kanesatake, where it is used in cultural and political events.

Contemporary wampum

The Seneca Nation commissioned replicas of five historic wampum belts completed in 2008. The belts were made by Lydia Chavez (Unkechaug/Blood) and made with beads manufactured on the Unkechaug Indian Nation Territory on Long Island, New York.

The Shinnecock Indian Nation has sought to preserve a traditional wampum manufacturing site called (Here, Wampum Was Made). A portion of the original site, Lot 24 in today's Parrish Pond subdivision in Southampton, Long Island, has been reserved for parkland.

The Unkechaug Nation on Long Island, New York, has built a wampum factory which manufactures traditional as well as contemporary beads for use by Native artists such as Ken Maracle, Elizabeth Perry, and Lydia Chavez in their designs of traditional belts and contemporary jewelry. The factory has been in existence since 1998 and has been instrumental in the resurrection of the use of wampum in contemporary Native life.

Contemporary wampum makers who used traditional methods include Julius Cook, Sakaronkiokeweh (Mohawk) (1927–1999) was a wampum maker who used traditional methods. and Ken Maracle, Haohyoh (Cayuga), a faith keeper of the Lower Cayuga Longhouse.

References

External links

Wampum article, Iroquois Indian Museum
Wampum History and Background
"The Tribes And The States: 100,000-Year History of North America"
X-ray showing inner spiral and entire shell of the Busycotypus Canaliculatus – Channeled Whelk Shell , Europa
"Money Substitutes in New Netherland and Early New York" , Coins, University of North Dakota
Wampum—Onondaga Nation
1764 Treaty of Fort Niagara Wampum Belts