Re: Types of numerals

Mark J. Reed wrote:
> On 1/4/06, caeruleancentaur <caeruleancentaur@...> wrote:
>
>>Carsten Becker wrote:
>>
>>
>>>>That's my 2 ct for today,
>>
>>John Vertical <johnvertical@H...> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>"Ct"? Interesting, I've before only seen "c" and "cn" used.
>>
>>Both "c." and "ct." are correct abbreviations for "cent."  "Cn." is
>>not.
>
>
> I've only seen ct. and ¢., other than in
> restricted-character-availability environments - but there the c is
> understood to represent ¢.
The recommended forms for use in Australia are $ with one slash (rather
than the double-slashed form you find in America) and c with no slash.
Obviously this has never stopped anyone using the double slashed and
slashed forms, but I don't think it's true to say that "c is understood
to represent ¢" "in restricted-character-availability environments"; "c"
is simply another option (also looking at the keyboard, $ was obviously
seen as unique enough to get itself a key, whereas ¢ wasn't, so I'd be
surprised if the unslashed form really was a restricted character
thing). I won't object if you can show me that my assumption is
wrong---you're quite good at that! :)

I've never seen anything other than "c" and "¢", rarely if ever with
fullstops after them. I'm certainly surprised that you've used "¢.",
with a full stop, implying it's an abbreviation rather than a symbol
(one never sees "$." or "£." or "€.").

Not that you see any abbreviation for cents very often. Cents don't buy
you much these days, and cent-coins just have the number on them, the
unit is implied (and even on dollar and two-dollar coins, the unit is
written as a word). (I hear NZ is soon to abolish its five cent
coins---something I hope we quickly adopt, too!)

> Maybe we should adopt "d" now that the UK isn't using it anymore. We
> do call one-cent pieces "pennies" informally. :)
>
> Hm.  Is there an etymological relationship beween "penny" and
> "denarius", or was it just a case of using Latin because That's What
> Was Done?
Just because That's What Was Done. In fact, the old way of writing money
as "5l. 11s. 14d." (for five pounds, eleven shillings and fourteen
pence) had all of them being Latin abbreviations---the "s." stood not
for "shillings" but "solidus". I imagine the name "solidus" for "/" is
somehow related to its use in "11/14" for eleven shillings and fourteen
pence, but I don't know which was the cause-and-effect is: was it called
"solidus", after the currency because of its use, or was it used because
it had the same name?

--
Tristan.

Replies