Speaking of money

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 87602

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister"
<gbannister10 at a...> wrote:

> Geoff: In 20th century terms, it wasn't particularly chaotic. All
> you  had to remember was 12 pence to a shilling and 20 shillings to
> a pound. Farthings went out in the 1950s and crowns were never 
> referred to in everyday speech because there were no crowns in 
> ordinary circulation. Guineas again had a fairly specialised use in 
> latter days very often in such things as art sales or auctions. The
> name still survives in the Newamrket 1000 guineas horse race today. 
> What we have lost are the old nicknames -  "tanner" for a sixpence, 
> "bob" for a shilling. "Florin" was used for a two shilling piece 
> which was introduced in an abortive 19th century plan to go decimal.

What was a sovereign?
 
> Far more chaotic was the Imperial system of weights and measures...
> weights: ounce/pound/stone/quarter/hundredweight/ton
> lengths: inch/foot/yard/chain/furlong/mile

I'm moving Weights and Measures to OT.

> Geoff:
> 29 Knuts to a Sickle and 17 Sickles to a Galleon gives you a very 
> helpful 493 knuts to a Galleon! Try getting Arthur Weasley to
> convert that to USD.

IIRC JKR said (quite illogically) that a Galleon is worth about 5
pounds UK. 493 Knuts is very close to 500 new pennies, so he can
estimate that way.