Chumash Indians were using highly worked shell beads as currency 2,000 years ago. ScienceDaily . Retrieved June 2, 2025 from www.sciencedaily.com / releases / 2021 / 01 / 210129120245.htm ...

As one of the most experienced archaeologists studying California’s Native Americans, Lynn Gamble knew the Chumash Indians had been using shell beads as money for at least 800 years. But an exhaustive ...

Chumash Indians Were Using Highly Worked Shell Beads as Currency 2,000 Years Ago Jan. 29, 2021 — Archaeologists show that the Chumash Indians had been using shell beads as money for at least 800 ...

Shell bead currency probably helped to facilitate the exchange of goods along California’s wide hunter-gatherer trade network, she concluded. For more on the Chumash, go to " World Roundup ...

Shell beads served as currency, exchanged alongside dried fish, baskets and obsidian tools for inland goods. The tomol represented more than transportation; it embodied Chumash engineering brilliance.

The type of beads used in Chumash necklaces may also have been currency PEOPLE living in what is now California may have been the first Americans to invent money, according to a new analysis of ...