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Olivella Shell Beads: The James Bennyhoff Typology
Derived from Pacific coast marine snails, olivella shell beads were widely used as ornaments throughout the prehistoric American West. This typology, with its disparate sources, is a prime example of the cumulative nature of museum research. Though collected across several decades in California and Nevada, these beads are stored together (this is a selection from the full set). Graduate student James A. Bennyhoff arranged his typology according to physical form. Once identified, an excavated bead could then be compared across time and space, as more or less common or as an indication of culture contact. In 1958, Bennyhoff first formulated the typology, which he expanded and revised in a widely-circulated but unpublished manuscript of 1967, and which was finally published, revised again, in 1987.
The Olivella shell, showing landmarks and loci of manufacture for various classes of beads," fig. 1, Shell Bead and Ornament Exchange Networks between California and the Western Great Basin, by James A. Bennyhoff and Richard E. Hughes (1987).
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