It is worthy of note that
as the name porcellana has been transferred from these shells to
China-ware, so the word pig has been in Scotland applied to crockery;
whether the process has been analogous, I cannot say.
Klaproth states that Yun-nan is the only country of China in which cowries
had continued in use, though in ancient times they were more generally
diffused. According to him 80 cowries were equivalent to 6 cash, or a
half-penny. About 1780 in Eastern Bengal 80 cowries were worth 3/8th of a
penny, and some 40 years ago, when Prinsep compiled his tables in Calcutta
(where cowries were still in use a few years ago, if they are not now), 80
cowries were worth 3/10 of a penny.
At the time of the Mahomedan conquest of Bengal, early in the 13th
century, they found the currency exclusively composed of cowries, aided
perhaps by bullion in large transactions, but with no coined money. In
remote districts this continued to modern times. When the Hon. Robert
Lindsay went as Resident and Collector to Silhet about 1778, cowries
constituted nearly the whole currency of the Province. The yearly revenue
amounted to 250,000 rupees, and this was entirely paid in cowries at the
rate of 5120 to the rupee.
