The British farthing (part 4)

Unfortunately, we are no longer able to see the denomination "1 farthing" in our change nowadays, this is due to a host of reasons: 1) they were all removed from circulation shortly after decimalization 2) they were worth less than what was neccessary in terms of the financial economy, a so-called "half-pence" was the lowest value denomination until the mid-1980's when they were also removed from circulation (production stopped half a decade beforehand). 3) The properties of the alloy used to create the coins was worth more than the coin stated itself (ie, alloy=1.1 pence, coins denomination=1 penny, the alloy was worth a tenth of a penny more than the coin). CONTINUED ON PART 5.

The British farthing (part 3)

Okay, finally, i will submit my introduction to the farthing. The farthing as i said in part 1 is the value of 1/3 of a penny. It has been used for around about a millennia and the most spoken of type is the Charles I "rose" farthing which is sourced from copper alloy. The farthing was used heavily in the Georgian era all the way from the George I "dump" issue coinage to the Victorian bronze coinage of 1860 onwards. In terms of metal detecting these are very common coin finds and are commonly referred to as "coppers". Farthings survived the transition from "hammered" to "milled" and went through early-milled all the way to the pre-decimal coinage of Elizabeth II. CONTINUED ON PART 4.

The British farthing (part 2)

We cannot say for certain that the United Kingdom decimalised on the exact year of 1971 as they issued coins prior to that date by about 3 years (1968) which saw the new 10p come into circulation which at the time had the same diameters as the pre-decimal florin, or two shillings (24 pence). For some reason they reduced the value from 24 pence to 10 pence but yet kept the parameters identical. The 5 pence was again kept the same size as a shilling (two shillings = 24 pence, 24 divided by 2 = 12 pence = one shilling) which equates to 12 pence. Again this value was reduced dramatically from 12p to 5p which again, theoretically, was unprofitable and called for a cheaper alloy to be used in the production of the coins. CONTINUED ON PART 3.

The British farthing (part 1)

The farthing was a fractional denomination worth 1/3 of a penny before we decimalised which saw the removal of it in British currency. The surviving half-penny was then altered in name to "half-pence" which suited the modern economy. The traditional abbreviation of penny, "d", meaning denarius (a roman coin) was then changed to the letter "p", which abbreviated the word "penny" or "pence", the word pence being the plural of penny in decimal terms, rather than it being the word "pennies" which was used prior to that of decimalisation. Because the UK decimalised in 1971 we have since lost many of the denominations that were used for more than half a millennia before that date, hence the reason for change. CONTINUED ON PART 2.