Fantasy and also history question: coins! :-)

After all, many fantasy books are simply based on historical fiction, but with magic and fantastical creatures, right?

Here's my question. Is anyone else tired of, bored with, and pissed at those writers who, for whatever reason, refer to the coins of their realm as "pieces"? You know -- gold piece, silver piece, copper piece, electrum piece, etc.

Any other who does this should be asked three questions:

1. What kind of author rips off D&D this blatantly?
2. Isn't it out of date, and -- worse -- a term that no-one in real life ever used or ever will use?
3. Isn't it much more fun to make up names for coins? Everybody does that IRL, so why not in fantasy or historical fiction?

In the USA, there are lots of terms for a dollar, a 25-cent piece, a 10-cent piece etc.
In the UK (before decimalisation -- sigh), there were heaps of coins and lots of names for 'em.

So why should a novel be different? Instead, think of the coins your characters might use, and then think up names for them. Your book is limited only by your imagination.

Here's an example: suppose a porter carries your character's heavy trunks into the inn. Your character thanks the porter, hands him a heavy golden coin, and says "Here is your tip, my good man: a gold piece!"

What is wrong with this scenario?

1. I don't know about you, but not many fantasy adventurers travel with trunks ... even iron-bound ones. (Yes, we know, Rincewind. Sit down).
2. How many fantasy inns have porters?
3. Even if there are porters, how common is gold in your fantasy kingdom (or republic, or whatever) that it represents a tip for a porter? (If it's common, no problem. If not ... that's a VERY generous tip!)
4. Speaking of which, how common is tipping in your fantasy world?
5. WHO THE F%&@ actually says the words "gold piece" unironically?

Now imagine if your adventurer (and his buddy, maybe) tip the same porter a golden coin for carrying their trunks. But before they give it to him, they start debating what it should be called. Adventurer #1 says "Eagle". Adventurer #2 says "Owl". And they start arguing, and the porter gets more and more annoyed, until they ask him what he thinks it should be called.

And he snaps: "My godsdamned dinner!", snatches the coin, stalks off in a huff, and goes to buy dinner with it.

Straight off the bat, we know that gold is really common here, if it costs a single gold coin to buy something as simple as dinner. Even better, we put some meat on the bones of the adventurers and the porter. Plus, we can tell that these coins were probably introduced recently, if they don't have a name yet.
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So now it's over to you. What's your view on this issue, hmm?

 

I could see the value issue coming up for the exchange of coins across kingdoms. Kingdom A, commonly known to have financial problems is suspected of mixing base metals Into its coins, so those coins if accepted by merchants, are only accepted at a dramatically discounted rate. Or the characters find their money is useless in their current town because there isn't a money changer in town.

Or even the characters being cheated on the exchange rate. A gold coin from kingdom A only being accepted as the value of a silver, when the real value is about half a gold.

 

I don't like the term "gold piece" but for the opposite reason than what is suggested here. If you're going to be simple, be even simpler. "gold coin" Everyone knows gold is a valuable metal, everyone knows coins are a type of currency. If a writer says "the hero bought a horse for 2 gold coins," there is no confusion as to what the gold coins are and why they were used to buy a horse. I have a strong belief of when in doubt keep it simple.

Having said that, currency can be used to enhance world building. Since currency is how we literally value things, how we portray our currency could give a peak into what the society 'values' (or what they claim to value). If it's a society based on religion maybe the currency has religious symbols, if it's a society based warfare maybe the currency has weapons, if it is a society based on a certain ideology maybe the currency has pictures of famous leaders of the ideology. It can be whatever.

I don't think it is necessary to use currency for world building, if you're going to go light on world building, currency is an okay place to do it, but if you're trying to portray the world as having super rich and deep lore, unique currency is a good place to sneak some world building in.

 

Hmm ... speaking personally, I'm leaning towards super-rich and deep lore. It's your world, you can make up whatever you want. Go wild.

The problem I have with "gold coin" is the same as "gold piece" -- it's too generic and too obvious. Besides, if someone hands someone else a coin and says "Here's an owl" (or whatever), and the other person hands over merchandise, it should be obvious to anyone what an "owl" is slang for.

I think "gold piece" only came about because of the whole "pieces of eight" slang that developed during the Age of Piracy. But even "pieces of eight" is now cliche.

As for whether it's necessary or not ... I wouldn't know about worldbuilding in D&D or whatever, but if you're writing a fantasy story, it'd be a crime to use something as generic as "gold coin" -- especially since fantasy, as a genre, seems more forgiving of books that are longer than usual.

One last thing:
In England, people say "quid", "sixpence", "tuppence", "ha'penny", "farthing" etc. - not "pound", "six pennies", "two pennies", "half a penny" or "a quarter-penny".

In the USA, as Homer said, people say "quarter", "dime", "nickel" or "penny" - not "25 cents", "10 cents", "5 cents", or "one cent".

In Canada, people say "loonie", not "dollar". They say "toonie", not "two dollars". $5 are "fivers" or "fins", $10 are "ten-spot", "dixie", or "tenner", and $100 is "C-note" ("C" for "century") or "bill".

The same thing happens around the world. So, if you're writing fantasy (or history, or ANYTHING), be creative!

 

Seconding all this.

One of my most successful stories centered on coins because of a series of murders where they were used as weapons, and the numismatics made for excellent worldbuilding opportunities. One nation is a horse culture, and so their coins are denominated in stallions (gold), mares (silver), and foals (iron). Another has such widespread access to a fantasy metal used for enchantments that they mint their most valuable coins with that metal, which becomes plot relevant.

Even with the countries that had less evocative names for their currency, it still added more color to the world to have marks and reales instead of generic names.

 

As I recall Leopold of Austria's ransom demand for Richard the Lionheart was 50,000 marks. That adds color.

 

Gold dragons, silver griffins, copper hedgehogs and iron ticks. If I were to create a fantasy world, those would be some of the denominations.

 

Good idea, Xoic. *nods* IIRC, the ancient Greeks had a similar system (i.e. four different types of coins).

After reading English history, I've noticed that English currency changed a lot over the centuries. There are coins that used to exist (e.g. guineas and sovereigns, or at the other end, shillings, sixpence, tuppence, farthings etc.) that don't exist anymore - at least, not on a day-to-day basis.

It's a pity, but decimalization helped bring in the tourists (who would undoubtedly have been confused). Then again, all those old coins sound fantastic.

 

Yes coming up with currancy names isn’t a bad idea and to remember that people use many different kinds of currency in a premodern system. I had one story I was writing where there are gold and silver coins called lustanzas and mestezas, lustanzas being worth about 100 mestezas. But these were only used for exchanges between noble houses. Commoners were paid in credit. The credit is measured in “mestezas” but the credit mestezas are highly variable in worth averaging about a hundredth of the actual coin value due to inflation (and the credits cannot be actually exchanged for currency). So the credit was essentially a different currency all together, thier actual value tied to the noble house issuing the credit.