My First Blog

In modern world countries have their own currencies as one of the national symbols. Have you ever thought about names for these currencies?

I’ve looked at some of them. The most frequently used names are dollar and euro. Also I want to bring to your attention some other types of currencies.

Dollar. Etymology of dollar is very old. This word came from Dutch/Low German daler. It is version of German taller that was shortened from Joachim staler. Those coins were minting in Sankt Joachimsthal, Bohemia, Czech Republic. This word came to North America in 17^th century, when Danish and Sweden colonists founded their settlements. Colonists used daler for silver coins that were in mass circulation in those times.

Euro. It is relatively new word. You can easily guess that it stand for European. Before Euro European union used ECU (European Currency Unit). In 1999 they decided to reject ECU and introduce Euro. First notes were issued in 2002.

And now a little bit more currencies.

British Pound. As you know pound is a currency in GB. This word came from Latin pendere that means to weight. Originally it was a pound of silver. First meaning was 12 ounces, than it changed to 16 ounces. Sometimes you can meet pound sterling. Sterling meant silver penny. There are some propositions that sterling come from star that was used for design of these coins. A pound sterling was originally “a pound weight of sterlings”. It was approximately 240 sterlings.

Japanese Yen and Chinese Yuan. Both words in each language means round object, circle. The Yuan was silver round coin introduced in the end of 17^th century. Also Yuan/Yen is used to name dollar.

Spanish Peso. This currency is used in many countries in Central and South America. Peso is also from Latin synonym to weight – pensum. Peso was introduced as Spanish currency in 16^th century. There were two types – silver (peso de plata) and gold (peso de oro).

Russian Ruble. There are a lot of discussions on the etymology of this word. The most possible one is that ruble was formed from Russian verb rubiti that means to chop, to cut. This proposition was based on that fact that first mention (14^th century) was found in region where silver bars were cut as needed and used as money.

I’ve mentioned only small part of possible currencies. But I think that tracing currency etymology we can find history of trading and possible equivalents for money. Do you agree?