Accession Number

1986.008.1266c

Creation Date

circa 1700

Description

Various color beads unsorted in clay matrix (see also 1986.008.1266a, b, d--i). One lead round shot (musket ball 1994.004.0003) found in this clay matrix.
Beads were a staple trade good of Europeans in Africa as well as in the Americas. These beads would be traded for slaves in Africa where they were highly desirable symbols of wealth and prestige.

Exhibition Label

The slave ship Henrietta Marie carried an untold number of small glass beads as part of its cargo of trade goods. Thousands of these beads have been found at the site of the wrecked slaver, most of them embedded in the silty, calcareous, muck sand of the sea-bottom. This is a recovered piece of that sea-bottom, roughly 7x8x9 centimeters, which has calcified and hardened and has trapped many of these “seed” beads. The most visible beads are green, but there are many white ones, too; ones that were originally blue but degraded during their time underwater.