Natural History Museum Vienna
Wenn es kein Logo gibt, wird diese Spalte einfach leer gelassen. Das Bild oben bitte löschen.
(Dieser Text wird nicht dargestellt.)
Naturhistorisches Museum Wien
Maria-Theresien-Platz
1010 Vienna
Austria
Opening hours:
Thursday-Monday: 9 a.m. – 6.00 p.m.
Wednesday: 9 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Tuesday: closed
©NHM Wien
©Bauer NHM Wien
The Natural History Museum Vienna
By Anita Eschner (3rd Zoological Department) & Karina Grömer (Prehistoric Department)
Natural History Museum Vienna
In 1889, the Natural History Museum on Vienna’s Ringstrasse was opened with its 39 large exhibition rooms, 8,460 square meters and more than 100,000 objects on display. The museum houses various collections from the realms of botany, zoology, geology, mineralogy and archaeology with more than 30 million objects.
The Natural History Museum in Vienna also exhibits means of payment beyond coins. In the Bronze Age, in the 2nd millennium BC, standardized groups of objects such as eyelet neck rings and bars first appeared in Central Europe, some of which were found buried in the ground in their hundreds. They can be seen as an early form of money. They can be viewed in Hall 11 of the museum.
Molluscs are presented in Room 23: Many shells or parts of shells were highly valued as pre-monetary means of payment. Cowrie or porcelain snails in particular made their way along old trade routes through South Asia and Africa to Europe.
Money was usually carried in the form of chains, with the quantity and type of snail indicating the wealth of the wearer. In addition to whole snail shells – especially porcelain snails (Cypraea) and sand snails (Nassarius), shells from cone snails (Conus) and Achatina snails (Achatina) were usually ground down or made into disc money. Shells from spiny snails (Spondylus) or quahog shells (Mercenaria) were also worked on, as were occasionally dentalium shells known as “elephant teeth”.
The means of payment commonly referred to as “shell money” was therefore made largely from snail shells and can therefore correctly be called “snail money” in many cases.
Literature:
Eschner, A. (2014): Saal XXIII: Weichtiere (Mollusken). – In: Jovanović-Kruspel, S. (eds.): Naturhistorisches Museum Wien. Ein Führer durch die Schausammlungen. 2. ed, Holzhausen Druck GmbH, Wolkersdorf, ISBN 978-3-902421-87-6. (pp. 151 – 157).
Grömer, K. & Kern, A. (eds.) (2017): Fundstücke. Kostbarkeiten der Jahrtausende. Ein Führer durch die Prähistorische Schausammlung. Naturhistorisches Museum Wien. Wien 2017: Verlag des Naturhistorischen Museums. (pp. 147-148).
