African Arts Gallery

This flat-shaped primitive African currency takes the form of a triangle extended by a handle. The surface is slightly hammered. The pointed base could be driven into the ground. Grainy oxidized patina. In Africa, before the colonial period, payments were never made in coins. Transactions were made using cowries, pearls, cattle, kola nuts, but also metals, particularly iron. These primitive currencies were used during commercial and social exchanges, for dowries in particular, but could also constitute objects of parade or throwing weapons. In Sierra Leone, goods were valued against iron bars called barriferri. The king generally controlled the production or routing of the kingdom's currency. The variety of these metallic forms is wide, and these sometimes take on the appearance of particularly aesthetic non-figurative sculpture.