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A Contribution to the Problem of Akori Beads

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Milan Kalous
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Extract

The problem of akori beads consists above all in the question of their [organic or inorganic] composition. If, according to the ‘water theory’, akori were some kind of corals, then how to explain their findings in old graves, where they remained in good state of preservation after the human bones decayed? In the present stage of research the following explanation might be offered: the term of ‘akori’ served for the designation of cylindrical and oval beads of varying composition and colour, made maybe of some now unknown kind of coral, but certainly also of stone or glass; perhaps the akori recovered from the sea-shores and rivers were not really corals but worked jewels from the corpses of those buried in the water or offerings to the sea-deity Olokun. The discovery in Ife of large production of glass beads seems to support this.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , March 1966 , pp. 61 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1966

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References

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