In Belfast: Paying with Pounds

In Belfast when buying dinner, a round of drinks or souvenirs we had to learn to navigate the British pound. Nobody could ever have invented the old UK currency system. It must have evolved that way. Until 1971 when they moved to a decimal system (1£ = 100p) overnight, people payed in pounds, shillings and pence, with some quirky variations.
 
One Shilling Coin
The old units of currency were abbreviated as: 
  • £  (pound), officially pound sterling
  •  /  (shilling)
  • d  (pence, inexplicably)
  • gn  (guinea)
  • -   meant no pennies

For example:
  • One pound (1£) was composed of twenty shillings (20/-). 
  • One shilling (1/-) was equal to twelve pence (12d).
  • All this made a pound equal to 240 pence.
  • One pence (or penny) was two ½ pence (pronounced HAY-p'nee) or four farthings.

Simple, huh? Something priced at two shillings and six pence (2/6d) was called two and six. That's easy to understand. Then the quirky stuff. Two pence (2d) was known as tuppence. Three pence (3 d) was thrupence or a thrupenny bit. Two shillings (2/-) was a florin. Sixpence (6d) was a tanner. One shilling (1/) was a bob. While two and six (2/6d)  was also known as half a crown, there was no such coin or note as a crown. A pound was, and still is, known as a quid.

Expensive stuff was frequently priced in guineas, also not a unit of currency. One guinea was defined as one pound plus one shilling (1£ 1/-) or 21/-. So, a refrigerator with a 200 guinea price tag was really going to cost 210 pounds (210£). Prices in guineas made expensive items look 10% cheaper.

For those who found all this incomprehensible the best way to deal with it was to pay with the largest note available and pocket the change. By the time I became accustomed to using British money the ship left Belfast for good. 

Today the British pound is evenly and happily divided into 100 (new) pence. Gone with the old system are most of the quirky names. The guinea, shilling and (old) penny (d) are no more, but new terms and pound slang will probably arise in time. For example 20p is often pronounced twenty pee.

In today's UK decimal currency the one shilling coin is still legal tender, the equivalent of five (new) pence (5p), or one twentieth of a pound. Sometimes the 2 shilling coin turns up, now worth 10p. Most people in UK have no knowledge of how their their old currency functioned.