Cowrie Shells are commonly understood as a thing that does not exist within Palo Mayombe but does exist within Lucumi.
Even to the extent where several practitioners of both traditions have stated with great conviction as if it were a fact.
I have not publicly spoken up on this subject before because it felt as though I would be arguing with the ignorant to educate them as to what it is they practice and this is not my responsibility, that responsibility belongs to their elders. I feel an obligation to speak on it now because I had a dream where people were attempting to “own” the history of Cowrie Shells to themselves. To understand how this all works and fits together, you have to understand the full scope of the situations at hand.

Lucumi is an Oricha-based tradition mainly originated from Cuba descending from Yorubaland Orisa based traditions. In most of this tradition things seemingly line up with the traditional side of things but in some areas we see big differences and most people accredit the differences to there being changes made specifically to survive slavery. In most cases this may be true but there are cases where the changes exist because concepts and practices from other traditions were adopted and the other traditions were never credited, thus being appropriations. It may come as a shock to many that Yemoja or Yemaya has nothing to do with the Ocean and she never did. You may have heard of a Pataki where she traded with Oya and that’s how she acquired the ocean but Oya had nothing to do with the ocean either. Both Yemaya and Oya were river goddesses. There are a great many people who would swear that Palo Mayombe stole the concept of their spirits from Lucumi, yet to the Bakongo people Kalunga has always been an ocean goddess for thousands of years. Its real easy to see the real origin of how Yemaya went from being a river goddess to an ocean goddess from this point on… Its also real easy to see why people went out of their way to say that Palo Mayombe took inspiration from Lucumi when “coming up with spirits.” There are dozens of these kinds of incidents, one being the “ownership” of Cowrie Shells. See, in Lucumi the belief is that the cowrie shells are the mouth of the Oricha. The Oricha speak via these cowrie shells in Odun. These have been a vital portion of the tradition of Lucumi for a long time, possibly even since the origins of Lucumi because in Yorubaland these cowrie shells had value and that predates the origins of Lucumi. So its not a stretch that when the traditions of Yorubaland arrived in Cuba via slavery, they brought with them the use and value of cowrie shells. This we can agree upon, the issue arises with the assertion that cowrie shells are exclusive to Lucumi because they were used traditionally in Yorubaland and not in Kongo.

Palo Mayombe is a Kimpungulu-based traditional religion originating in the Kongo dia Ntotila kingdom and mainly evolving in Cuba out of necessity to survive slavery. In most of this traditional religion things seemingly line up with what was once practiced in the precolonial Kongo with some evolution involving the concealment of the practiced portion of the traditions and the unification of all the traditions into one centralized traditional religion with several houses to represent the various tribes and lineages. The need for secrecy was key in order to survive slavery but also in order to deter anymore appropriations occurring, historically there has been many appropriations of these traditions from across the world, it’s not just a Lucumi issue. Appropriations of Bakongo traditional religions can even be traced back in other traditions and religions. With this specific evolution, where the traditions are unified into one traditional religion and secrecy became absolute, the traditional religion was better equipping itself to handle slavery and beyond. So where do we find cowrie shells in this tradition? Nsimbo or Simbo is a word used to describe money, it is a very common word and just about every practicing member of the Palo Mayombe traditional religion has heard of. I am not sure people understand this implication and maybe never thought about it in-depth. We know its money but what kind of money? Is it the US Dollar? The Euro? The Pound? Oh no, this is a currency that was unique to Africa, shell money. I will say that again, Nsimbo or Simbo is shells used as money. For the precolonial Kongo kingdom, they would have specifically used the Olivella nana also known as The Sparkling Dwarf Olive. There are even historical references to the fact that the precolonial Kongo did not import or trade with others to acquire these shells, these were actually locally sourced in Luanda Island. Speaking of being locally sourced, the references even talk of precolonial Kongo then spreading this currency as far as Benin. In other words, although Benin and surrounding areas may have used shells and may have had their own local sources, even back then precolonial Kongo had its own major influence and use with these shells and other kingdoms and countries acknowledged it. Somewhere around the beginning of slavery there would have been a shift due to sourcing issues. The specific shells that were commonly found back home were no longer available to the Bakongo and so they began using the closest available substitute, Cypraea tigris also known as Tiger Cowrie. These specific cowrie shells were chosen because of their similar appearance to the traditional shells used back home, while the Lucumi would have used along the lines of Monetaria annulus also known as Ring Top Cowrie. In a weird twist of fate, people decided to stop acknowledging that Bakongo themselves also had natively used shells as money and this would give birth to the use of them within spirituality because we do have knowledge of adding things of value to spiritual objects and it would not have been a stretch to see the shells themselves used in the creation of Nkisi and used to communicate with Nkisi.

In closing, while Lucumi did always have cowrie shells, the Bakongo always had shell money as well and the jump from one shell to another due to shortage in supply is not one done to steal from another peoples traditional practices but to continue in our own. Both traditions have had these shells for a very long time and saying that one is the original owner is erasing of history of how these shells came to be so important and what exactly it is that they were and why they came to be so important within their respective traditional religions. I would advise you and any elders who may read this to evaluate the stances taken on whether or not Palo Mayombe “is allowed” or “has” cowrie shells. We have always had them, without your permissions. You have always spoken of them, thinking you were talking of US Dollars. Respect the histories of these traditional religions, stop erasing them with modern colonized mindsets.

If there is any doubt as to the words I am speaking, I will cite this reference for your consideration: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_money