Chris Hansen’s blog

In one of the email lists I have the pleasure of participating in, I was asked the question:

1. Before the Brits revised their currency to a decimal system, we were forced to try to learn to use arcane divisions of the English pound: guineas, sovereigns,shillings, pence, ha’pennies, etc. It is clearly impossible for someone who is not born a Brit to get comfortable with this Byzantine system and it allowed crafty Brits to victimize us in even the simplest financial transactions. By the way, what is a Pound? A pound of what? Gold, porridge, or what?

I answered thus:

A pound sterling, as its full name might suggest, was originally a pound of sterling silver (.925 pure). Successive monarchs debased the currency until one of them had the bright idea of printing “One Pound” on pieces of paper thus allowing him to keep all the silver for himself. The note said that you could exchange it for one pound sterling at the Cashier’s Window of the Bank of England, but if you went there and tried to exchange a pound note for one pound sterling they’d just give you another pound note which said exactly the same thing. The cashier was trained to continue to do this until you got tired of asking and went away.

So what’s so difficult about 12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings (bob) to the pound, 21 shillings to the guinea, 1/2 a penny to a ha’penny, 1/4 penny to the farthing, three pennies to the thruppenny bit, 2s 6d to the half crown, 5s to the crown, sixpence to the tanner, 2 shillings to the florin?

Here’s a maths problem which even a first form child could have solved. If Featherstonehaugh (pronounced “Freestonhew”) has a pound note which his mother has given him to get the groceries, and she wanted:

1 packet of Twiglets (8d)
1 packet of Woodbines (2s)
1 box of Swan Vestas (to light the Woodbines) (1s 5d)
1 pint of milk (2s 7d)
1 loaf of bread (2s 3-1/4d)
2 bacon butties for his and his mum’s tea (1s 11d each)
1 potato for Dad’s (the Old Man’s) dinner ( 5d )
1 slice of gammon (ditto the dinner) (2s 6-1/2d)
1 bottle of Bass (ditto ditto) (3s 3-1/4d)

and on his way home with the groceries Featherstonehaugh encounters the neighbourhood bully, who demands a tanner for sweets and threatens to beat him up if he doesn’t give it him, then why on the next day did Featherstonehaugh fail his history O-levels exam?

Answers on a postcard, please. My answer is below under a cut.

Snip to diversion (cue the travelling music, played by the maestro on the old joanna:)

“The ragazzo of the Elephant and Castle, that’s me.” Ya got me there, Chris. Am completely gobsmacked. What does it mean? Inquiring minds wanna know!

I live in the area of Souf Lunnon referred to as the Elephant and Castle, probably named after the heraldic device of someone connected to the area of an elephant with a castle on its back, and not after the Infanta del Castile or some such piffle. It is known for its historic pub named, er, the Elephant and Castle, and for Newington Butts, so named after the area where the local yeomen were required to do their archery practice when the King or Queen wanted to conquer someplace or hold off someone’s army while the Navy kicked them in the bum on the high seas. Ragazzo is, I believe, Italian for “boy”.

Anyone interested in the answer to the maths problem I set above (questions on exams here are “set”, rather than “given” or “asked” or “administered”).?

Featherstonehaugh Featherstonehaugh III (pronounced “Freestonhew Fanshaw” as “Featherstonehaugh” is pronounced differently as a Christian name than it is as a family name) failed his history O-levels because he hadn’t eaten for almost the whole day because his mum (Frances “Fanny” Featherstonehaugh) washed his mouth out with strong carbolic which left a nasty taste in his mouth and removed his appetite entirely after he called his father (F. Featherstonehaugh Jr.) a “bloody a*sehole” because he caned poor F.F. III as he had come home with no change because the grocery bill had come to 19 shillings and the grocer gave him just one bob as his change and since the bully wouldn’t take “I haven’t got a tanner” for an answer Featherstonehaugh Featherstonehaugh III had to give the bully the entire shilling thus leaving no change for his mum and dad when he got home and F.F. Jr. accused the lad of buying loose Woodbines to smoke behind the bicycle shed at school with the bob instead of bringing it home.

Simple, no?

I believe that is the longest sentence I’ve ever written with no commas, colons, dashes, or semicolons in it.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 5th, 2010 at 08:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.