what in hell is a ha' penny?

[night force cynic]

Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat
Please put a penny in the old man's hat

If you haven't got a penny, a ha' penny will do,
If you haven't got a ha' penny, then God bless you

seriously, what is a ha' penny!?

a penny in the US is 1 itty bitty cent, how can you cleave that value in half and make a half penny? is that or was that really a coin that existed?


and I might as well ask how a pence and a quid convert to USD. GBP (pounds) are easy, xe.com helps us out at work to do those conversions, but how do the smaller units convert?



just curious here... I seriously have no idea why this question occurred to me 10 minutes ago.

[The Kraken Wakes]

yup 1/2 pences used to exist, after decimilsation too... I remember buying half penny sweets in my youth...

[Ross SC]

yeah, then you got 2 for a penny when they 1st got rid of them!

[Sundance]

British coinage these days goes:

1p
2p
5p
10p
50p
£1
£2

then it's the £5 £10 and £20 notes, and then £50 if you're a tourist. (seriously, i never see £50 notes in the shop unless it's a tourist...)

if you want old money, try looking up British coinage on wikipedia. that'll confuse you with pennies, shillings and pounds and so on.

to quote a Sir Terry Pratchett gag:

'and British people resisted decimilisation for years, believing it to be too complicated'...

[The Baron]

You missed out the 20p coin!

[SteveD]

You missed 20p's off sundance! My favourite of all the small denomination coins!

[The Baron]

Too slow, amigo!

[Sundance]

GAH!

i coulda swore i put it in...

[The Baron]

I'm actually a bit perturbed that SteveD has favourite coins... Is there any currency you dislike, Steve?

Seriously, if anyone here can't abide the £20 note I'll reluctantly find them a good home.

[Sundance]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_coinage