The presence of shells in prehistoric burial places indicate that their symbolic power was believed to continue beyond life. Shells in some cultures even today are used as amulets, good luck charms, and as symbols for love, fertility and life eternal. Ceremonial garbs are many times decorated with shells and were used in some religious ceremonies. North American Indians also made fetishes of shells. The Canadian Ojibwa tribe maintained a Grand Medicine Society in which the sacred emblem was a shell.
Priests also use it for holding sacred oils.
Most shells will open to the right. The Chank or Turbinella also plays a significant role in their ritual music and ceremonies, and figures into Buddhist iconography. Pilgrims to this shrine purchased the simple but exquisitely sculptured scallop shells and wore them as a sign of their pilgrimage to the shrine. This scallop also appears in many paintings and statues of this saint throughout Europe. Egypt, China and other cultures used the cowry in connection with their burials.