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Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, No. 2 [1930], 34); and French pucelage, lit. maidenhood, a
common designation of the Cypraea, which SCHILDER (in Zeitschr. für Ethnologie, 58 [1926], 323)
cites from a conchological work of c. 1800, but which is given earlier in ADANSON's Histoire naturelle
du Sénégal (1762, 65), the Encyclopédie (XIII [1765], 105) and SONNERAT (Voyages, II, 97), and must
even be much more ancient (I suspect in this use of « pucelage » a phonetic alteration of « porcelaine »,
« pourcelaine », with semantic attraction). Most scholars have agreed with MAHN.
The one notable dissident was YULE (Hobson-Jobson², 725), according to whom the Cypraea
shells were called porcellana or porcelletta « almost certainly from their strong resemblance to the
body and back of a pig, and not from a grosser analogy suggested by MAHN... That this is so is
strongly corroborated by the circumstance noted by Dr. J. E. GRAY (see Eng. Cyc. Nat. Hist.,
s. v. Cypraeidae) that Pig is the common name of shells of this family on the English coasts; while
Sow also seems to be the name of one or more kinds ». To which may be added that χοιρίνη itself
may be conceived as merely meaning « pig[-shell] », on account of a comparison with a pig, that
two species of Cypraea are popularly known in Taranto as porcelli di Sant' Antonio (SCHILDER,
loc. cit., 325), a designation which certainly does not carry any allusion beyond the very name « pig »,
that modern Greek employs γουρουνάκι, « little pig », as the designation of a Cypraea (KELLER,
loc. cit., II, 543), that pigs are associated with cowries in New-Guinea (cf. JACKSON, 200), and perhaps
also that, in the Admiralty Islands, a currency made of shell disks is known, in the local pidgin
English, as « pig money » (cf. O. SCHNEIDER, Muschelgeld. Studien, Dresden, 1905, 59). ANDERSSON
speaks of a French popular name porc de mer, but this is a mistake for pou de mer, mentioned
by SCHILDER (p. 326) and JACKSON (p. 126), and, long before them, by the Encyclopédie (t. XIII
[1765], s. v. porcelaine, p. 105); JACKSON, however, while correctly giving pou de mer (126 and
200, alongside of the French [!] porcellana), seems to have interpreted pou de mer as « sea pig »,
while it is « sea louse ».
The fact is that the chain of evidence in favour of MAHN's explanation is far from being as
complete as has been generally admitted. That, from prehistoric times, a sexual meaning attached
to the cowry is not to be denied. But it is a matter of surprise to read in such authoritative books
as JACKSON's Shells as evidence of the Migrations (p. 126) and J. ANDERSSON's Children of the
Yellow Earth (London, 1934, 305) that the word « cowry » « is derived from a Greek word which
means 'a little pig' » (i. e. χοιρίνη), and that « the name given by the Romans to this shell was ' porci '
or ' porculi ': in fact, « cowry » is certainly borrowed from Hindi kauṛī (see « Cowry »), and it is
true that porcus has been used in Latin with an obscene implication, but neither porcus, nor porculus
or porcellus is known to have been employed in Latin as the designation of a shell (cf. KELLER, loc.
cit., II, 543). Even if we leave out the Latin, as we must do, and merely derive Ital. porcellana
from Ital. porcella, « sow », this does not necessarily imply anything beyond what the words actually
mean.
Nor are the opinions of RUMPHIUS (1705), or even of ALDROVANDI (1606), adduced by SCHILDER
(loc. cit., 323), of any moment. RUMPHIUS (RUMPH) gave to the genus Cypraea the name Porcellana,
and on that occasion expanded on the allusive meaning of Latin porcus (loc. cit., 113, 180). Following
Elliot SMITH's Introduction to J. W. JACKSON's Shells as Evidence of the Migrations of Early
Culture, ANDERSSON (pp. 304-305) quotes to the same purpose ADANSON's Histoire naturelle du