Canadian 25 cent

[gpimper]

Sorry, pics could have been better.  I do like the Canadian designs, though!  Most likely picked this up in Quebec...possibly Newfoundland.

[Figleaf]

I find the portrait side fairly boring. It's just a copy of what is used on UK coins. This particular portrait was introduced at the time of decimalisation. Both were met with criticism. Decimalisation was called "unnecessary, unwarranted and un-English". The portrait was dismissed as "the queen turning her back on her people". Change is so frightening.

The animal on the other side was introduced in 1937 and created by a Mr. Hahn, who, in spite of his cocky German name, was Canadian. It is generally described as a caribou, but what is a caribou? In English, you'd call it a reindeer. In French, the animal would be called renne. However, Canadian french is subtitled on french TV and there is a reason. In Canada, a renne is a caribou when it is born in Canada, otherwise it is a renne. Father Christmas' sleigh is therefore drawn by rennes, even in Canada and biologically, that's a caribou but you can't say it is.

Something similar happened to the poor moose. In old french, it was known as orignal, a Basque word for a deer-like animal. A "real" French word wasn't necessary, as the moose did not occur in France. When trade with Scandinavian countries flourished, their name for the animal was adopted and frenchified to élan. Too late for Canada. Their moose remained an orignal if it was born in Canada, but its non-Canadian members of the family had to make do with élan.

Peter

[FosseWay]

Even in English there is transatlantic confusion.

As Peter says, a North American caribou is the same as a European reindeer (ren in Swedish).

A North American moose is the same as a European elk (älg in Swedish).

But there is also an animal called elk in North America, which is also known as wapiti, which is more closely related to the European red deer (hjort in Swedish) than to the European elk.

A similar issue occurs with bears. The creature known in UK English as a brown bear and in Swedish as just "björn" (there are no other kinds in Sweden) is a grizzly bear in North America. The black bear, smaller and commoner in North America, does not exist in Europe.

[gpimper]

Having grown up in the mountains of eastern Arizona I'm very familiar with both the black and brown bears.  My High School mascot was the Elk    Used to hunt but now just observe.  We've a totally different line-up of critters here in Texas.  Bobcats, smaller deer, beavers, cool turtles, racoons the size of large dogs...even had a jaguar in our back yard (down at the lake house property).  Fun stuff!