Money in Africa

Cowry shells, copper, glass beads, brass manillas and even bottles of gin have all served as money in Africa, and these twelve papers, first given at a conference at the British Museum, trace how such currencies shaped trade, power and daily life. The scope runs from the tenth century to the present, moving from pre-colonial exchange through the coinage of the colonial era to counterfeiting, banking and what money symbolises in modern African societies.

The contributors come from several disciplines, so a chapter on archaeology may sit beside one on economic history or visual culture, and the effect is of many angles on a single, surprisingly revealing subject. It is a scholarly collection, clear rather than dense, and it rewards anyone curious about African history, the British Museum's collections or the strange, shifting question of what makes something count as money.