Re: Denarii (was: Celtic months)

[Andrew Smith <hobbit@mail.earthlight.co.nz>]

On Fri, 29 Jan 1999, Raymond A. Brown wrote:

> The denarii-solidi-librae currency was _not_ the Roman system so any
> question of its 'survival' is spurious.
Oops.  My mistake.

  Indeed, the 'shilling' did not
> make its appearance until 1504.

I guess you mean the coin.  The word comes from good Germanic stock.

> The Romans did bequeath us a pound weight (libra) of twelve ounces and a
> foot measure of twelve inches.  Both 'ounce' & 'inch' are derived from
> Latin 'u:ncia' (1/12), the former via Old French & the latter via Old
> English.  These measures have survived in these islands right up to the
> present day, except that the 12-ounce 'Troy' pound is used only by
> goldsmiths & silversmiths AFAIK, the later averdupois pound having 16
> ounces.   I have no doubt these measures would have survived in Britain in
> any credible alternative post-Roman Britain.
> 
I have this horrible fear that I'm going to find *ync on one of my lists -
which would mean ultimate unvoiced dental fricatives do exist in
Brithenig.  (eek!)

One of my personal language favourites was finding that the word for pound
in Dutch now also means half-a-kilo in metrics.

> The denarius, whatever its value, does seem to persisted right throught the
> roman period and, as we have seen, way beyond it.  It seems to very unlikly
> it would not have survived in post-Roman Britain.
> 
Padraic has confirmed that the 240d to the pound did survive in Kemr.
This may mean that the kenig only survives as a coin now consigned to
history. 

> 
> Whether the Chomro would at some time have some intermediary coin - mark,
> noble, angle, crown, shield (ecu, scudo) etc - is, of course, a matter of
> speculation for us and discovery for Andrew :)
> 
Alternative numismatics?!

- andrew.

Andrew Smith, Intheologus 			hobbit@earthlight.co.nz

Difference in opinions hath cost many millions of lives: for instance,
whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether the juice of a certain
berry be blood or wine; whether whistling be a vice or a virtue; whether
it be better to kiss a post or throw it on the fire..., with many more.
				- Jonathan Swift; Gulliver's Travels.