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QUESTION:
> I had thought, when I came across this usage (lowercase L
> currency) on a previous occasion, that pounds sterling _were_
> meant. What is the pound sign, if not a stylised L?
> A further question: When did "livres" (I am hypothesising that
> this was the earlier currency unit) become "pounds" in english
> currency?
>
> Charles Booth
> Bristol Business School
> University of the West of England
> email:
REPLY:
The Carolingian monetary reform of ca. 796-800 made the "pound" of
commercially fine silver -- the libra, supposedly equal to the old
Roman pound weight of 12 (Roman) ounces -- a money of account for
reckoning values, prices, rents, etc; and it was divided into 20
"shillings" or solidi (from the Roman gold coin the solidus); and each
solidus was divided into 12 denarii (from the Roman silver coin the
denarius). But the denarius (denier) was the only coin then struck -- 240 to
the pound weight of silver (in theory at least). Most, though not all, West
European monetary systems used and continued to use this pound-based
system up to the French Revolution; and the British continued to do so
until 1973. Thus libra, lira, livre, pfund, pond, pound all had their
origins in the Carolingian system; but they all diverged from the
Carolingian silver-pound and from each other because of continual coinage
debasements (or affaiblissements) that lowered the silver contents of
the various coinages by some combination of reductions in weight and
fineness. The English pound sterling supposedly originates with or came
soon after the Norman Conquest, and was based on the Tower Pound of 12
ounces = 349.9144 grams of silver 92.5% fine (11 oz 2 dwt silver and
18 dwt copper, except during the debasements of Stephen and Henry
VIII). As late as the reign of Edward I (up to 1279) only 242 pence
were struck to the Tower Pound; by the reign of Edward IV (from 1464)
450 pence were struck to the Tower Pound (displaced by the Troy Pound
in 1526). Even so the now much reduced English pound sterling was then
worth about 8.5 times as much as the French livre tournois, in terms
of relative silver contents.
The normal Latin abbrevation used was li, which became the stylized
pound sign in English usage, placed before the numerical amount; but
the French livre tournois was normally rendered as the single,
lower-case scripted l, immediately after the amount. That letter might
also indicate one of the various Italian lira moneys of account; but
usually the documents specify which lira -- Genoese, Florentine,
Milanese, etc. -- is being used. (In France, scripted "l" might also
indicate the older livre parisis; but it was largely displaced by the livre
tournois by the 14th century, so that thereafter everyone would assume
-- in France -- that the pound indication applied only to the livre
tournois.) Similarly in the Low Countries, with a wide variety of
pound-based moneys-of-account, the documents normally specified which
one was being used, by symbol and name.
Another frequently used money of account was the mark, which equalled
two-thirds of the pound, or 13 4d.
Here endeth the lecture.
--
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Prof. John H. MUNRO office: (416) 978 - 4552
Department of Economics home: (416) 231 - 4412
University of Toronto
150 St. George Street
Toronto, Ontario CANADA M5S 1A1
fax: (416) 978 - 6713
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