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PHOTOS: © JLIMAGES/FRANCISCO MARTINEZ/ALAMY/MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY 2015/NATIONAL CIVIL WAR CENTRE
etail chaos, confusion and even riots had been predicted. But when Britain finally adopted decimal coinage in 1971 the transition proved surprisingly smooth. Fifty years on, with many people having known nothing different, you can be forgiven for wondering what all the delays and fuss had been about. Proposals for decimal coin systems had been made in Britain as far back as the late 17th century – Sir Christopher Wren was one notable fan – and a decimal lobby in the Victorian era had managed to secure the introduction of a florin (worth one-tenth of a pound) in 1849. But it took until the 1960s, with Britain in danger of being the only major country in the world without a decimal currency, for the government to decide to replace the centuries-old money system based on 12 pennies to the shilling and 20 shillings to the pound with the simpler system of 100 pennies to the pound and denominations of 5p, 10p, 50p and the like. Intensive preparations, publicity campaigns and the phasing in of new coins culminated in ‘D Day’, or Decimal Day: 15 February 1971. Of course, coins have never simply been about their value as money and Britain’s deep-rooted attachment to its pre-decimal system highlighted how much coins reflect a nation’s sense of itself, its culture, technology, power struggles and beliefs. Minting (manufacturing coins) in Britain began around the end of the 2nd century BC, was largely put on hold during Roman rule, and got going again with the appearance of gold coins around AD 630, followed by silver ‘sceattas’ – the first English pennies. Alfred the Great silver pennies c.880, bearing a stylised portrait of the king and explicit ‘Londonia’ monogram, are often taken as a convenient start-point for the story of The Royal Mint. The London mint was one of many around the country – more than 70 existed in the reign of Aethelred the Unready (978–1016) – but by the time of Henry VIII www.britain-magazine.com
