Money cowry
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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
Money cowrie shells were used as money in places including Africa and Asia.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Money cowry
- Scientific name
- Monetaria moneta
- Japanese name
- キイロダカラ
- Group
- Ocean animals
- Class
- Gastropoda
- Order
- Littorinimorpha
- Family
- Cypraeidae
- Genus
- Monetaria
It lives from south of the Boso and Shimane Peninsulas through the seas from India to the western Pacific.
How the Money cowry lives
It lives on intertidal rocky areas and reefs.
粟国村Basic data
- Range
- South of the Boso and Shimane peninsulas and the Indo-West Pacific
Where the Money cowry has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- キイロダカラ
- 简体中文
- 货贝
- 繁體中文
- 黃寶螺
- 한국어
- 돈개오지
- Français
- Cauri
- Deutsch
- Kaurischnecke
- Português (Brasil)
- Búzio-moeda
- Italiano
- Ciprea moneta
- العربية
- الودع النقدي
- Tiếng Việt
- Monetaria icterina
- Русский
- Каури-монета
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 鳥羽水族館 — キイロダカラChecked: 2026-11-04
- 粟国村 — キイロダカラChecked: 2026-11-07
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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