Manilla Bracelets as Trade Objects

Timeline

1. c. 1550–1640Elmina Castle trading post · Gold CoastPortuguese and later European traders at Gold Coast castles exchanged copper bracelets, cloth, and firearms for gold and ivory; manilla bracelets gradually became one of the standardized units of trade valuation along the West African coast.
2. c. 1641–1650Slave trade ports of the Gulf of Guinea · Gulf of GuineaIn the 1640s, English, Dutch, and Spanish slave traders paid local chiefs and middlemen in strings of manilla bracelets in exchange for captured Africans shipped to the Caribbean and Brazil; the bracelets served both monetary and ceremonial functions in coastal and inland markets.
3. c. 1660–1700Benin and the lower Niger River · NigeriaBracelets penetrated deep inland via trans-Saharan and river trade routes, where in places like the Kingdom of Benin they circulated alongside local copperware and cloth, becoming one of the most important forms of European-imported metallic currency in the 17th-century West African long-distance trade network.