Shilling (United Kingdom)
Encyclopedia
Kingdom of Great Britain
The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...
and the later United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
; also adopted as a Scot
Kingdom of Scotland
The Kingdom of Scotland was a Sovereign state in North-West Europe that existed from 843 until 1707. It occupied the northern third of the island of Great Britain and shared a land border to the south with the Kingdom of England...
denomination upon the 1707 Treaty of Union
Treaty of Union
The Treaty of Union is the name given to the agreement that led to the creation of the united kingdom of Great Britain, the political union of the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, which took effect on 1 May 1707...
.
The word shilling
Shilling
The shilling is a unit of currency used in some current and former British Commonwealth countries. The word shilling comes from scilling, an accounting term that dates back to Anglo-Saxon times where it was deemed to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere. The word is thought to derive...
comes an accounting term that dates back to Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
times, deemed to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere.
There counted twelve pence to the shilling, with twenty shillings to the pound
Pound (currency)
The pound is a unit of currency in some nations. The term originated in England as the value of a pound of silver.The word pound is the English translation of the Latin word libra, which was the unit of account of the Roman Empire...
.
The British shilling had succeeded the English shilling
Shilling (English coin)
The English shilling was a coin of the Kingdom of England, when first introduced known as the testoon. It remained in circulation until it became the British shilling as the result of the Union of England and Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707.There were twenty shillings to the...
, and it remained in circulation until Decimal Day 1971
Decimal Day
Decimal Day was the day the United Kingdom and Ireland decimalised their currencies.-Old system:Under the old currency of pounds, shillings and pence, the pound was made up of 240 pence , with 12 pence in a shilling and 20 shillings in a...
. Upon decimalisation the British shilling was superseded by the five-pence piece
British Five Pence coin
The British decimal five pence coin – often pronounced "five pee" – is a subdivision of pound sterling first issued on 23 April 1968 in preparation for the 1971 decimalisation of the currency. At that time it had the same value, size and weight as the existing shilling, and it may be...
having a comparable value, size and weight. The pre-decimal shilling was withdrawn from circulation in 1990, when the five pence piece was reduced in size.
1706 to 1816
Shillings were minted in every monarch's reign. During the early part of the reign of George IIIGeorge III of the United Kingdom
George III was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of these two countries on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until his death...
, very few shillings (like other silver coins) were struck, although there was a large issue in 1787. A small number of coins dated 1763 were distributed by the Earl of Northumberland
Earl of Northumberland
The title of Earl of Northumberland was created several times in the Peerages of England and Great Britain, succeeding the title Earl of Northumbria. Its most famous holders were the House of Percy , who were the most powerful noble family in Northern England for much of the Middle Ages...
in Ireland; this issue is now very rare, but the contemporary rumour that the issue limit was £100 (2000 pieces) is probably untrue. In 1787 the hearts were left out of the Hanoverian shield in error, but the error was so minor that it took some time for it to be noticed and corrected, so both types are of similar value. The mint coined a large stockpile of silver belonging to a consortium of London bankers into shillings of 1798, which were subsequently declared illegal, reclaimed and melted down. There may have been over 10,000 pieces minted, but there are currently only about four known to exist and an example could be worth over £10,000 in any condition.
1816 to 1967
For the Great Recoinage of 1816Great Recoinage of 1816
The Great Recoinage of 1816 was an attempt by the British Government to re-stabilise the currency of Great Britain following economic difficulties precipitated by the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars.-History:...
, the mint was instructed to coin one troy pound (weighing 5760 grains) of standard (0.925 fine) silver into 66 shillings, or its equivalent in other denominations. This effectively set the weight of the shilling, and its subsequent decimal replacement 5 new pence coin, at 87.2727 grains (or 5.655 grams) with a diameter of 24 mm from 1816 to 1990, when the new smaller 5p coin was introduced.
In 1920, along with other national coins, the silver
Silver
Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...
content was reduced from 92.5% (sterling
Sterling silver
Sterling silver is an alloy of silver containing 92.5% by mass of silver and 7.5% by mass of other metals, usually copper. The sterling silver standard has a minimum millesimal fineness of 925....
) to 50%, and in 1947 to pure cupro-nickel.
The shilling coin issued in most of the 20th century was virtually identical in size and weight to the German 1 Deutsche Mark coin (sufficiently similar to be interchangeable in coin-operated machines). This reflected the pre-First World War exchange rate of 20 marks to one pound; by the end of the shilling's circulation, the mark was worth six times as much.
During the reign of Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
, shillings were minted featuring both the English three lions passant coat of arms, and the Scottish lion rampant coat of arms (see illustration above).
Before decimalisation, there were twenty shillings to the pound and twelve pence
Penny (British pre-decimal coin)
The penny of the Kingdom of Great Britain and later of the United Kingdom, was in circulation from the early 18th century until February 1971, Decimal Day....
to the shilling, and thus 240 pence to the pound. Two coins denominated in multiple shillings were also in existence at this time. They were the florin
British Two Shilling coin
The British two shilling coin, also known as the florin or "two bob bit" was issued from 1849 until 1967. It was worth one tenth of a pound, or twenty-four old pence...
(two shillings), which was in general circulation and adopted the value of ten new pence (10p) in 1971, and the crown (five shillings), the highest denominated non-bullion UK coin
Bullion coin
A bullion coin is a coin struck from precious metal and kept as a store of value or an investment, rather than used in day-to-day commerce. Investment coins are generally coins that have been minted after 1800, have a purity of not less than 900 thousandths and are or have been a legal tender in...
at decimalisation. The crown was not in general circulation at the time, however, being minted infrequently to commemorate important occasions (e.g. the coronation of a new monarch
Coronation
A coronation is a ceremony marking the formal investiture of a monarch and/or their consort with regal power, usually involving the placement of a crown upon their head and the presentation of other items of regalia...
).
Withdrawal
The last shillings issued for circulation were dated 1967, although proofs were issued as part of a collectors' set dated 1970. In 1968, the new decimal five penceBritish Five Pence coin
The British decimal five pence coin – often pronounced "five pee" – is a subdivision of pound sterling first issued on 23 April 1968 in preparation for the 1971 decimalisation of the currency. At that time it had the same value, size and weight as the existing shilling, and it may be...
coin (initially called "five new pence"), with the same weight and specifications, started to replace the shilling. It initially inherited the shilling's slang name of a bob, though this word has since increasingly fallen out of use. Shillings and florins (two-shilling coins) remained in circulation alongside the 5p and 10p coins until 1990, when smaller 5p and 10p coins were introduced. The Shilling was finally withdrawn on 1 January 1991.
In popular culture
A slang name for a shilling was a "bob" (plural as singular, as in "that cost me two bob"). The first recorded use was in a case of coining heard at the Old BaileyOld Bailey
The Central Criminal Court in England and Wales, commonly known as the Old Bailey from the street in which it stands, is a court building in central London, one of a number of buildings housing the Crown Court...
in 1789, when it was described as cant, "well understood among a certain set of people", but heard only among criminals and their associates.
In The Gambia
The Gambia
The Republic of The Gambia, commonly referred to as The Gambia, or Gambia , is a country in West Africa. Gambia is the smallest country on mainland Africa, surrounded by Senegal except for a short coastline on the Atlantic Ocean in the west....
, white people are called toubabs, which some claim derives from the fact that the price of a slave was two shillings, or from the colonial practice of paying locals two shillings for running errands—though some consider this explanation implausible.
To "take the King's shilling
King's shilling
For many years a soldier's daily pay, before stoppages, was the shilling given as an earnest payment to recruits of the British Army and the Royal Navy of the 18th and 19th centuries...
" was to enlist in the army or navy, a phrase dating back to the early 19th century.
To "cut someone off without a shilling" (or "with a shilling", that is, with no more than a shilling) means to disinherit.