Abstract
Frederic Mishkin’s three traits of money are examined in light of Native American wampum. This paper explores some of these issues concerning Native American wampum and can be of help to economic historians concerned with money issues. The presentation is qualitative rather than quantitative. There is some attention given to the non-monetary uses of wampum in this article. In addition, a comparison of wampum to the stone money of Yap is provided. Keywords: Native Americans, wampum, Dutch colonials, American colonial trade, necessary traits of money, Yap stone money. JEL Classification: E40, N11
Highlights
The manufacture of wampumWhite wampum was created from working out the inside of the conch, which is a “large spiral univalve marine shell”
This paper explores some of these issues concerning Native American wampum and can be of help to economic historians concerned with money issues
That is a big difference between Yap stone money and Native American wampum
Summary
White wampum was created from working out the inside of the conch, which is a “large spiral univalve marine shell”. Slotkin and Schmidt (1949) acknowledge the different degrees of technological advancements, and point out that adequate technical abilities for the manufacture of enough types of wampum were part of Native Americans before the arrival of the Western Europeans. Speck (1919) focuses on the lesser technological capacities of the Native Americans before the arrival of Western European settlers in manufacturing shell beads to create wampum. This is because, before the arrival of the Western European, wampum was used rarely as a medium of exchange. True black beads were valued more than white beads (Jacobs, 1949; Myers, 1970)
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