Wampum

Wampum is a traditional shell bead of the Eastern Woodlands tribes of American Indians. It includes white shell beads hand fashioned from the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell and white and purple beads made from the quahog or Western North Atlantic hard-shelled clam. 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 or The Hiawatha Belt. Wampum was also used by the northeastern Indian tribes as a means of exchange,[1] strung together in lengths for convenience. The first Colonists adopted it as a currency in trading with them. Eventually, the Colonists applied their technologies to more efficiently produce wampum, which caused inflation and ultimately its obsolescence as currency.

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.[2] Sewant or suckauhock beads are the black or purple shell beads made from the quahog or poquahock clamshell Mercenaria mercenaria.[3] Sewant or Zeewant was the term used for this currency by the New Netherland colonists.[4] Common terms for the dark and white beads are wampi (white and yellowish) and saki (dark).[5] The clams and whelks used for making wampum are found only along Long Island Sound and Narragansett Bay. The Lenape name for Long Island is Sewanacky, reflecting its connection to the dark wampum.