1865 American 3-cent piece

[Figleaf]

If it makes you feel better, there are plenty of things I don't like, but whole nations are not among them.

Let's just give this a rest, shall we? We'll not advance this way.

Peter

[translateltd]

Drifting from the original topic somewhat (as one does), I note that Japan put on its first 2, 1 and ½ sen coins in the 1870s "fifty/one hundred / two hundred pieces make one yen" in Classical Japanese above the denomination.  Not sure whom this was meant to help, though, as if you were educated enough to read a character-based language that was almost entirely different to that spoken on the street at the time, you would surely be switched on enough to understand what "1 sen" itself meant, especially as the smallest coin (1 rin) and the larger coins from 5 to 50 sen carried no such additional information.  Unless - he says, thinking as he types yet again - it was to indicate that the copper coins were of fixed value and no longer subject to the fluctuations of the old copper/brass/iron "cash" coins.

And what could the point possibly have been in Spain's telling us that its copper ten centimos of 1870 made up "one hundred pieces to a kilogram"?

[translateltd]

Let's just give this a rest, shall we? We'll not advance this way.

Believe me, I'd love to see it given a rest.  Anyway, the linkage between numeric denominations, decimalisation and the French Revolution is the key story, which seems to be not quite as firm as initially thought :-)

[Ukrainii Pyat]

Oh my

[<k>]

I have an unsubstantiated theory.

The US had (has?) a hate affair with the French revolution, seeing only the terror and none of the accomplishments. One of these accomplishments is a logical, decimal series of coins with denominations in numerals. To stress its affinity with Burke's Britain and not Paine's Britain, it chose consciously not to have French-like coins, but Spanish-like coins. While the reason to do this was eventually forgotten, the tradition remained.

A denomination in numerals helps those who do not speak the language, ergo denominations in letters on dollars, in figures on euros?

Peter

To say that the advantage of decimal coinage over, say, the pounds-shillings-pence system I grew up with, is one of logic is to use the wrong term. The pounds-shillings-pence had its own internal logic, and I had no problem learning it as a child. However, it dealt in 12's and 20's, but the decimal series has a simpler set of logic, where everything is in tens. In my IT days, I learnt the KISS principle: "Keep it simple, stupid", and ideally as simple as possible - a principle that stood me in good stead when I started designing systems; and for that reason I will, in May, also be voting AGAINST the adoption of the convoluted "Alternative Vote" system in this country (though the first-past-the-post system is hardly satisfactory).

However, to say next that figures rather than literals is also more "logical" and a sign of modernisation doesn't stand up. That only follows if you expect a significant number of your people not to speak the language; even then, in the UK today, there are only eight denominations of coins, therefore only eight sets of legends to learn - not beyond the wit of any immigrant or tourist, I should hope. But from that point of view, since the EU is multi-lingual, it makes sense in Euroland.

The other thing to remember is that the UK is an island or set of islands; we didn't/don't have the sense of large borders with large populations of foreigners, over which influence flows. This led to more of a literally insular sense of tradition: "Well, we've ALWAYS done it like this!" (even if we sometimes hadn't, e.g. Britannia on the coins). The question then is, if we're NOT doing something, who is it NOT because of? The French? The Spanish? The Americans? The Russians? We can't logically say. This is where your logic falls down, and you are right to say your theory is an unsubstantiated one.

You would also be wrong to pick Mrs Thatcher as representative of Britain; though she was revered by many, EVERYTHING was political for her, and her views became more eccentric the longer she was in power. She was also often cricitised by Conservatives for NOT being a Conservative! And you can see that she combined traits of modernisation AND Conservatism within herself.

The USA and France were NOT the first to decimalise, I am proud to say that Russia was during the reign of Petr I nearly 90 years before.

So France was not the first.

Hmmm ... the first French coins of the decimal series in the late 1790s read UN CENTIME, CINQ CENTIMES, UN DECIME, and Napoleon's two smallest silver denominations read QUART and DEMI FRANC; whereas the last pre-decimal issues showing Louis XVI said things like "6 D[eniers]", "2 S[ols]" ...

And you dismissed Martin's evidence (illogically):

This is of course how the denial trap works

Not something I'm knowledgeable about, but very unscientific of you to dismiss potential evidence like that.

Ultimately, it's far easier to say why somebody DID do something than why they didn't - especially if they gave no reason for NOT doing something. The fact that we British didn't decimalise in the 1950s can hardly be put down to a fear of the French, or of Bonaparte, especially since the florin was introduced in Victoria's time as a preparation for decimalisation. The battle between modernity and conservatism is one that always rages: the British coinage of the 1930s shows that clearly: all heraldic, apart from a representational ship (halfpenny) and wren (farthing) - combinations of two different series, as we now know.

Somehow I get the impression that Martin takes perceived anti-British criticism harder than us full Brits, and that therefore you are subconciously more likely to aim it at him - the Dutch being argumentative because they are too small to be warlike these days.  Maybe it's because Martin left my birth city when he was only five...  But I do believe he is a bit-of-both, i.e. has dual Kiwi-British nationality. 

[villa66]

...So France was not the first....

When it comes to adopting a decimal currency, I don't believe France was even second (although it was an extremely close third).

But don't let's forget the British, who were the first to realize an indispensable quality of modern coinage: token intrinsic value. The British were acting on that idea from 1816, and the American failure to understand it caused us incredible trouble decade after decade.

v.

[villa66]

And what could the point possibly have been in Spain's telling us that its copper ten centimos of 1870 made up "one hundred pieces to a kilogram"?

Because it gives the coins additional household and business utility? Whether the use was designed-in or not, I know that some 19th century British and Canadian copper coins were kept around to serve as scale weights.

v.

[Ukrainii Pyat]

Because it gives the coins additional household and business utility? Whether the use was designed-in or not, I know that some 19th century British and Canadian copper coins were kept around to serve as scale weights.

v.

Not sure on the Canadians, but no doubt whatsoever on the British - the 1797 "Cartwheel" penny and twopenny coins which did in fact weigh one and two ounces respectively and really are a marvel of their age - large, well struck, and meaningful pieces that served Britain well into the 1840's - contemporary coin surveys in Yorkshire attest to that.  I have some coins and tokens, well circulated, that I keep as utility items still - paperweights.

[Figleaf]

But don't let's forget the British, who were the first to realize an indispensable quality of modern coinage: token intrinsic value. The British were acting on that idea from 1816, and the American failure to understand it caused us incredible trouble decade after decade.

It's a very old idea, actually, but it took centuries before the role of fiduciary and money quantity was fully understood.

The Chinese issued a rather stable cash coin (and paper money) with values established "by the emperor". This made prices very volatile and cash unacceptable elsewhere, but it worked for centuries in China until trust was eroded.

Next in line (skipping the Venetian embassies and the Amsterdam Exchange Bank, because they were non-sovereign issuers) may be Sweden, with baron Görtz's token dalers. He found out the hard way what happens if fiduciary money loses trust. Next is Ireland, with gun money, reduced to intrinsic value by winner William III. Law's bank is next. Law is blamed, but actually the regent, who kept ordering more issues of assignats should shoulder more of the blame. However, the regent did show the correlation between the price of money in terms of goods (inflation) and the money supply.

The British government built on the accumulated experience and failures of centuries in 1816.

Peter

[villa66]

...The British government built on the accumulated experience and failures of centuries....

So do we all, if we have any sense. So let's not fail to give the British their due. They addressed the problem in 1816 and made it stick.

v.

[villa66]

Because of Quant.Geek's post on the American 3-cent piece, I thought I'd bring back this thread.

The 3-cent pieces of 1865-1889 are copper-nickel coins, in contrast with the much smaller 3-cent silver pieces of 1851-1873, and had much different careers. The copper-nickel 3-cent was often called a "nickel" by the American public (anticipating the 5-cent "nickel" of 1866--and 2012, for that matter).

The 3-cent silver, on the other hand, well, here's Breen, in his Encyclopedia of U.S. and Colonial Coins: "[The silver 3-cent pieces] quickly acquired the nickname of 'fish scales.' (Nobody called them 'trimes': This later neologism, invented by Mint Director James Ross Snowden, hardly got into use outside coin-collecting circles, if there.)"

(Breen wrote this in 1974, and in his 1988 encyclopedia--where it also appears--he titled the chapter dealing with the 3-cent silver "Longacre's Trimes." Given how influential his book has proved, it's fair to say that he himself did much to increase the currency of the nickname!)

v.