Dentalium (anthropology)
The word "'dentalium'" or dentalia (plural), as used by archeologists and anthropologists, means tooth shells or tusk shells, in an archeological or anthropological context. These tusk shells or tooth shells are seashells, the shells of scaphopod molluscs. The shells are not necessarily from species in the genus Dentalium (genus) as it is currently defined, but they are certainly within one of the genera in the family Dentaliidae[1].
The use of these shells by Amerindians is well-known in the archaeological literature. This usage is found along the western coast of Canada and along the Pacific Ocean coast of the northwest USA[2] extending southward to Southern California.
Dentalium shells were historically harvested from deep waters around the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, because they were highly valued by First Nations peoples as a an international trade item. Peoples of the Northwest Pacific Coast would trade dentalium into the Great Plains, Great Basin, Central Canada, Northern Plateau and Alaska for items including many foods, decorative materials, dyes, hides, Macaw feathers coming from Central America, turquoise from the Southwest, as well as many other items.
On the California Central Coast, for example, Dentalium neohexagonum has been recovered from prehistoric habitation sites of the Chumash who apparently used these shells as tubes,[3] possibly in jewelry items.
This kind of shell is still appreciated as a decorative bead object for native regalia. The Nez Perce would pierce their noses and wear dentalia through their septums; this practice led to the current name applied to the tribe.[4]
References
- "dentalium". Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. 2nd ed. 1989.
- James Ruppert and John W. Bernet, Our Voices: Native Stories of Alaska and the Yukon, 2001, University of Toronto Press, 394 pages ISBN:0802084672
- C. Michael Hogan, Los Osos Back Bay, The Megalithic Portal, ed. Andy Burnham (2008) [1]
- Josephy, Alvin M. (1997). The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest. Houghton Mifflin Books. ISBN 0395850118. p 23.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia; from the article "Dentalium". Image Credit.
