Beautiful old headrest with cowrie shells Cowrie shells meaning: • Currency and Trade: cowries served as a currency, standard trading medium, and tax/dowry payment method up until the 20th century. • Wealth and Status: Because they were durable, portable, and hard to counterfeit, possessing strings of cowries signified high economic standing, power, and abundance. Kings, chiefs, and royalty adorned crowns, thrones, and garments with them. • Spiritual Protection and Divination: Many communities use cowries as protective amulets against negative energy and the evil eye. Spiritual practitioners and diviners (such as in Yoruba Ifá traditions) also cast cowrie shells to read patterns and deliver guidance from ancestors or Orishas.