thumb|upright 1.2|Solidus of [[Theodosius II, minted in Constantinople . This design of the emperor with the spear over his shoulder was the conventional portrait for over a century in the Eastern Roman Empire, from AD 395 to 537]]

thumb|upright 1.2|Solidus of [[Constantine the Great, minted in AD 324 or 325]]

The solidus (Latin 'solid'; <small>:</small>&nbsp;solidi) or nomisma () was a highly pure gold coin issued in the Later Roman Empire and Byzantine Empire. It was introduced in the early 4th century, replacing the aureus, and its weight of about 4.45 grams remained relatively constant for seven centuries.

In the Byzantine Empire, the solidus or nomisma remained a highly pure gold coin until the 11th century, when several Byzantine emperors began to strike the coin with less and less gold. The nomisma was finally abolished by Alexios I Komnenos in 1092, who replaced it with the hyperpyron, which also came to be known as a "bezant". The Byzantine solidus also inspired the zolotnik in the Kievan Rus' and the originally slightly less pure gold dinar first issued by the Umayyad Caliphate beginning in 697.

In Western Europe, the solidus was the main gold coin of commerce from late Roman times to the Early Middle Ages.

In Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, the solidus also functioned as a unit of weight equal to Roman pound (approximately 4.45 grams).

Solidus as a Roman coin

thumb|upright 1.2|Solidus of [[Constantius II from Antioch, 347–355. A holed coin such as this was likely worn as a jewelry piece by a prominent or wealthy Roman]]

The solidus was initially introduced by Diocletian in small issues and later reintroduced for mass circulation by Constantine the Great in and was composed of relatively solid gold. Constantine's solidus was struck at a rate of 72 to a Roman pound (of about 326.6 g) of gold; each coin weighed 24 Greco-Roman carats

(189&nbsp;mg each), or about 4.5 grams of gold per coin. By this time, the solidus was worth 275,000 increasingly debased denarii, each denarius containing just 5% (or one twentieth) of the amount of silver it had three and a half centuries beforehand. With the exception of the early issues of Constantine the Great and the odd usurpers, the solidus today is a much more affordable gold Roman coin to collect, compared to the older aureus, as well as those of Heraclius, Honorius and later Byzantine issues.

In the Byzantine period

alt=Note the exergue on the reverse "OB+✱" The solidi of Constantinople bore the legend "CONOB", and the OB+✱ indicated that the coin was of a lighter weight than the standard.|thumb|Light-weight solidus of 22 [[Siliqua|siliquae minted by emperor Tiberius Constantine at Antioch in Syria, . The light-weight solidi were minted from c. 550–650 and were primarily used for foreign trade with Europe.]]

The solidus was maintained essentially unaltered in weight, dimensions and purity, until the 10th century. During the 6th and 7th centuries "lightweight" solidi of 20, 22 or 23 siliquae (one siliqua was 1/24 of a solidus) were struck along with the standard weight issues, presumably for trade purposes or to pay tribute. The lightweight solidi were especially popular in the West, and many of these lightweight coins have been found in Europe, Russia and Georgia. The lightweight solidi were distinguished by different markings on the coin, usually in the exergue for the 20 and 22 siliquae coins, and by stars in the field for the 23 siliquae coins.

Despite the Eastern half of the Roman Empire being predominantly Greek speaking, its coins were still inscribed in Latin well into the eighth century. The letters in the inscriptions began to lose their Classical Latin look under the emperor Heraclius, and the Latin text was replaced with Greek script in the early years of the ninth century, during the reign of Constantine VI.

In theory the solidus was struck from pure gold, but the limits of refining techniques meant that, in practice, the coins were often about 23k fine (95.8% gold). In the Greek-speaking world during the Roman period, and then in the Byzantine economy, the solidus was known as the νόμισμα (nomisma, plural nomismata).

Impact on world currencies

In medieval Europe, where the only coin in circulation was the silver penny (denier), the solidus was used as a unit of account equal to 12 deniers. Variations on the word solidus in the local language gave rise to a number of currency units:

France

thumb|Northern Gaul "sou", probably struck by the [[Visigoths c. 440–450, 4.24 grams]]

In the French language, which evolved directly from common or vulgar Latin over the centuries, solidus changed to soldus, then solt, then sol and finally sou. No gold solidi were minted after the Carolingians adopted the silver standard. Thenceforward, the solidus or sol was a paper accounting unit equivalent to one-twentieth of a pound (librum or livre) of silver and divided into 12 denarii or deniers. The monetary unit disappeared with decimalisation and introduction of the franc by the French First Republic during the French Revolution in 1795, but the coin of 5 centimes, a twentieth part of the franc, inherited the name "sou" as a nickname: in the first half of the 20th century, a coin or an amount of 5 francs was still often referred to as cent sous.

To this day, in French around the world, solde means the balance of an account or invoice, or sales (seasonal rebate), and is the specific name of a soldier's salary. Although the sou as a coin disappeared more than two centuries ago, the word is still used as a synonym of money in many French phrases: avoir des sous is being rich, être sans un sou is being poor (same construction as "penniless").

French Canada

In Canadian French, and are commonly employed terms for the Canadian cent. and are also regularly used. The European French is not used in Quebec. In Canada one hundredth of a dollar is officially known as a cent (pronounced /sɛnt/) in both English and French. However, in practice, a feminine form of , (pronounced /sɛn/) has mostly replaced the official "" outside bilingual areas. Spoken use of the official masculine form of cent is uncommon in francophone-only areas of Canada. Quarter dollar coins in colloquial Quebec French are sometimes called (thirty cents), because of a series of changes in terminology, currencies, and exchange rates. After the British conquest of Canada in 1759, French coins gradually fell out of use, and became a nickname for the halfpenny, which was similar in value to the French . Spanish pesos and U.S. dollars were also in use, and from 1841 to 1858 the exchange rate was fixed at $4 = £1 (or 400¢ = 240d). This made 25¢ equal to 15d, or 30 halfpence i.e. . In 1858, pounds, shillings, and pence were abolished in favour of dollars and cents, and the nickname began to be used for the 1¢ coin, but the term for a 25¢ coin has endured.

In the vernacular Quebec French and are also frequently used to refer to money in general, especially small amounts.

Italy

The name of the medieval Italian silver (plural ), coined since the 11th century, was derived from .

This word is still in common use today in Italy in its plural with the same meaning as the English equivalent "money". The word , like the French mentioned above, means the balance of an account or invoice; the German is a loan word with the same meaning. It also means "seasonal rebate".

Switzerland

In the Italian-speaking regions, the word , on top of its modern uses in Italian, is still used in its archaic meaning: the pay soldiers receive. This is also true in French-speaking Switzerland, where Swiss soldiers will receive – ; and German-speaking Switzerland, where it is .

In Italian the verb means hiring, more often soldiers () or mercenaries, deriving exactly from the use of the word as described above.

Spain and Peru, Portugal and Brazil

As with soldier in English, the Spanish and Portuguese equivalent is soldado (almost the same pronunciation). The name of the medieval Spanish sueldo and Portuguese soldo (which also means salary) were derived from solidus; the term sweldo in most Philippine languages (Tagalog, Cebuano, etc.) is derived from the Spanish.

The Spanish and Portuguese word saldo, like the French solde, means the balance of an account or invoice. It is also used in some other languages, such as German and Afrikaans.

Some have suggested that the Peruvian unit of currency, the sol, is derived from solidus, but the standard unit of Peruvian currency was the real until 1863. Throughout the Spanish world the dollar equivalent was 8 reales ("pieces of eight"), which circulated legally in the United States until 1857. In the US, the colloquial expression "two bits" for a quarter dollar, and the stock market currency real last used for accounting, traded in of a U.S. dollar until 2001, still echoes the legal usage in the US in the 19th century.

The Peruvian sol was introduced at a rate of 5.25 per British Pound, or just under four shillings (the legacy soldus). The term soles de oro was introduced in 1933, three years after Peru had actually abandoned the gold standard. In 1985 the Peruvian sol was replaced at one thousand to one by the inti, representing the sun god of the Incas. By 1991 it had to be replaced with a new sol at a million to one, after which it remained reasonably stable.

United Kingdom

King Offa of Mercia began minting silver pennies on the Carolingian system . As on the continent, English coinage was restricted for centuries to the penny, while the scilling, understood to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere, was merely a unit of account equivalent to 12 pence. The Tudors minted the first shilling coins. Prior to decimalisation in the United Kingdom in 1971, the abbreviation s. (from solidus) was used to represent shillings, just as d. (denarius) and £ (libra) were used to represent pence and pounds respectively.

Under the influence of the old long S , the abbreviations "£sd" eventually developed into the use of a slash , which gave rise to that symbol's ISO and Unicode name "solidus".

Vietnam

The French term sou was borrowed into Vietnamese as the word xu (). The term is usually used to simply mean the word "coin" often in compound in the forms of đồng xu () or tiền xu (). The modern Vietnamese đồng is nominally divided into 100 xu.

See also

  • Roman and Byzantine coinage
  • Bezant
  • Hoxne Hoard
  • Solidus and slash punctuation marks

References

Notes

Bibliography

  • <cite id=refPorteous1969></cite>
  • Online numismatic exhibit: "This round gold is but the image of the rounder globe" (H. Melville). The charm of gold in ancient coinage.