TOGO,
Lome region, 19th c. & earlier, holed
stones, @ 36.00 each
a) ~45mm diameter
b) ~47x35mm sold
c) ~~50x43mm
d) ~64x42mm
e) ~53x48mm
Click picture for enlargement.
" There is a close relationship between
beads and holed stones (which may be their ancestral type) and the holed
stones of the Gold Coast and Togo (Pl- 3, Fig- 3) have found their way
into many currency collections.' These are pierced quartz disks, some 2
to 2½ inches (5 to 6-5 cm.) in diameter, and about 1 inch thick.
Suggestions for their use are: spindle whorls, digging-stick weights, loom
weights, net sinkers, necklaces, arrow and implement sharpeners, fire-making
apparatus, and sacred insignia. But as they have been found in considerable
numbers, one hoard under an old tree (Worobong, Kwahu district) containing
hundreds if not thousands, they may be an early form of currency.
There is less
uncertainty about their modern use, which is as charms or amulets.
The natives believe that they have fallen from the sky, some regarding
them as the female counterpart of the miniature stone implements or 'god
axes ' of the same region (Wild, 1927, pp. i82-4; Man, I943, i[8).
The holed stones collected by Rattray in Togoland (now in the Pitt Rivers
Museum) were placed in water and the water thus impregnated was used for
washing and drinking, and stones were occasionally ground and the powder
administered for medicinal purposes, just like that of ' aggry ' beads."
Quiggin, A. Hingston, A Survey of Primitive
Money, 1949
home
email
Bob Reis
POB 26303
Raleigh NC 27611
USA
phone: (919) 787-0881
(8:30AM-10:30PM EST only please)
fax: (919) 787-1882
how to order