SecretLeeds - History, culture and architecture in Leeds

jim wrote: ↑

Tue 16 Feb, 2021 10:11 pm

I wonder if "deaner" is an alternative spelling for dinar, a monetary unit of a number of Mediterranean currencies? The term is itself an adaptation of denarius, a Roman coin. I remember ten shillings being called half a nicker

And the reason that the signifier for the old penny was d.

Digging around in my memory, I think that one of the things some people found confusing was the retention of some of the old coins with a new designation. I'm thinking in particular of the shilling and two shilling coins which became 5p and 10p. I think the 6d (2½p) was another.

Another little oddity was that organisation were allowed to do their accounting conversion with or without the new ½p.

I particularly remember that because in those days, one of the police allowances was 6d a week lamp allowance. Leeds City Council adopted the ½p conversion table so that converted to 2½p a week, paid as 10p every four weeks on pay day. After amalgamation in 1974 West Yorkshire used the whole new penny conversion so the weekly allowance was converted to 3p ie 12p every four weeks. Today, that sounds laughable, but it was an increase of 20% on what was in those days worth more than it would be today. And significant enough for me to remember.

tomq wrote: ↑

Wed 17 Feb, 2021 8:31 pm

And the reason that the signifier for the old penny was d.

I vaguely remember knowing that from primary school.
But only recently learnt ( 50 years too late!) that LSD, Libra Solidus Denarius, were all Latin in origin.
Solidus and Denarius were both Roman coins.
Libra = pound ( originally had the value of a pound of silver).

More French than Roman it would seem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C2%A3sd