Conch - Literature and The Oral Tradition

Literature and The Oral Tradition

William Golding's Lord of the Flies features frequent references to "the conch". In the book, the conch is used as a trumpet to call everyone together and held by whoever is speaking at meetings, symbolically representing democracy and order. The conch is seen as a delicate and beautiful object to represent this concept, although its fragility is shown when it "exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist."

The famous Old English riddle Ic wæs be Sonde describes a conch: "I was by sound, near seawall, at ocean-stream; I dwelt alone in my first resting place. ... Little did I know that I, ere or since, ever should speak mouthless over mead-benches." Another meaning given to this riddle ‘Ic wæs be Sonde’ is that the sound of the conch corresponds to spiritualised sound as heard in higher realms. In the Hindu tradition, the conch shell is used in ceremony as the sound it makes is said to correspond with higher frequency universal sounds associated with music of the spheres.

In popular folklore, it is believed that if one holds an open conch shell (or any other large marine snail shell) to the ear, the ocean can be heard. This phenomenon is caused by the resonant cavity of the shell producing a form of pink noise from the surrounding background ambience.

In Prakrit poetry, the conch (शंख; shankha) has an erotic connotation:

Look,

a still, quiet crane

shines on a lotus leaf

like a conch shell lying

on a flawless emerald plate.

(Hāla's gāhā sattasaī 1.4; tr. M. Selby)

Ostional, a pueblo in the municipality of San Juan del Sur in the Rivas Department of the southwest region of Nicaragua, by accounts of multiple testimonials in the local region, was founded by their ancestors because of an abundant conch population at the sea shore. Subsequently, the tribe used conch shells in many rituals and customs. In 2008, witnesses at local archaeological digs reported conch shells were found in the graves of some indigenous people in their recently rediscovered cemetery grounds. Some still maintained jade stones, implying the significance of conch shells within their tribal society.