Re: OT: the euro & 01.01.02 (was NATLANG/FONT:)

Tristan Alexander McLeay wrote:

 > Eeks... you seem to have (had) a complicated currency structure...
 > but that still doesn't explain where `dime' comes from...
 > Apparently, it comes from OF `disme' from `decima pars', a tenth
 > part, but that doesn't explain how it came to be used to mean 10c.

Because it is a tenth of a dollar.

 > Was the word once more common? Was a tenth of a pound or a shilling
 >  called a dime?

Thomas Jefferson just made up mill, cent, di(s)me for a thousandth,
hundredth, and tenth of a dollar, as far as anyone knows; these terms
were not applied to pre-Revolutionary currency.

The Mint Act of April 2, 1792 specified "...that the money of account of
the United States shall be expressed in dollars or units, dismes or
tenths, cents or hundredths [...]"  The actual coins authorized by the
Act were the $10, $5, and $2.50 pieces (gold); the dollar, half dollar,
quarter, disme, and half disme (silver); and the cent and half cent
(copper).  "Dime" is a natural anglicization, I suppose.

As for the other units, "dollar" is short for Joachimstaler: the
Joachimstal (Jachymov Valley) was a source of silver from which
excellent-quality coins were made.  "Eagle" represents the bald eagle,
the American national bird, _Haliaeetus leucocephalus_.

BTW, the term "nickel" is unofficial, like "penny"; the coin says
"FIVE CENTS" on the reverse.

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