Chapter XX

, section ‘The Carat and the Grain.’

2. GUERNSEY CURRENCY

In this curious relic of the old French monetary system the Livre is the equivalent of the _louis d’or_ of 24 francs; the Sol or sou is a shilling, 1/20 of the livre; the Denier is a penny, 1/12 of the shilling, and it is divided into 8 doubles, each equal to the old French _liard_ or quarter-sou of 3 deniers, not to the old French double of 2 deniers. The only Guernsey coins are the bronze pieces of 8, 4, 2, 1 doubles; that of 8 doubles being the penny.

The silver coins are French, counted 10 pence to the franc; so that the five-franc piece passes for 4_s._ 2_d._ Guernsey.

The Guernsey pound is either a bank-note for this amount, or 24 francs in French silver, equal to 240 Guernsey pence. Sovereigns are current, taken at the usual rate of 25 francs and 2 pence = 252 pence or 21 shillings Guernsey. So the English sovereign becomes a guinea in French silver and Guernsey bronze.

The people of Guernsey hold by their old system; they find no inconvenience in it; and it is decidedly advantageous to the English resident in the island.

3. INDIAN MONEY

The East India Company made little change in the monetary system of the Mogul Empire. In the greater part of India the silver rupee was the standard of value, and the E.I.C. struck Sicca rupees (_sikkah_, coined) in the name of Shah Alam, the Great Mogul reigning at the end of the eighteenth century. These weighed 192 grains, but they were superseded in 1836 by the present standard of rupee, 180 grains, of which 165 fine, bearing the English sovereign’s head. The rupee is divided for account into 16 annas, each of 12 copper pies, though the coin so called bore until recently the Persian inscription _salas pai_, one-third of a pie; the real pie, inscribed _ek pai_, one pie, being the quarter-anna.

There are silver coins of a half, quarter and eighth of a rupee, but no anna coin. The copper or bronze coins are half, quarter and twelfth annas.

The monetary system of the Madras Presidency (the people of which are a different race, speaking Dravidian languages, not the Indo-European languages of which Hindustani is the _lingua franca_) was different from that of the rest of India. It was a gold-standard country, the monetary unit being the ‘Varahan’ or ‘pagoda,’ a small thick gold coin of 53 grains, reckoned as equivalent to 3-1/2 rupees or nearly 8 shillings. There were also gold Fanams of about 6 grains, and still smaller gold coins, used principally for largesse at festivities.

The Star-pagoda, the usual gold currency, was of button-shape, with a star on the convex surface, a Hindu deity on the flat. It weighed 52-1/2 grains, the same weight as the Roman denarius, the Arabic dinar, and the Venetian zechin, but it was only 19-1/2 carats fine. The E.I.C. coined pagodas of lesser weight, about 46 grains, but of English standard fineness. They also coined silver fanams, 42 being nominally equivalent to the pagoda. These weighed 15 grains, so that they were equivalent to 1/12 of the 180-grain rupee, to 1-1/3 anna, or to 4 copper pysa. So there was in the Madras Presidency a double monetary series, based on the gold pagoda and on the silver rupee, the relative value of these coins being of course inconstant. Gradually during the nineteenth century the gold standard was replaced by silver, the change taking the following order:

1. The Pagoda of 42 fanams of 8 pysa of 4 kásh.

The Rupee of 12 fanams.

2. Then the two-anna piece replaced the fanam, taking its name.

The Rupee of 8 fanams, of 6 pysa, of 4 kásh.

3. The Rupee of 16 annas, of 3 pysa, of 4 kásh.

4. The Rupee of 16 annas of 4 quarter-annas (called 3/4 pysa by the natives) or of 12 kásh improperly called ‘pies.’

The division of the rupee into 8 fanams of 24 kásh survives, or did survive till quite recent years, in the French settlements of Pondichery, &c. The reason alleged was that the anna is non-existent as a coin. But it is curious that the French administration did not discover that there was a decimal system connected with the rupee. For in Southern India thirty years ago, and perhaps at the present day, the pysa was = 1/3 anna and the half-pysa 1/6 anna, but these were always reckoned among the people as 1/50 and 1/100 rupee.[37] To the people of the South the rupee is divided into 5 fanams each of 10 pysa each of 3 kásh. But the term kásh (kássu) is merely a name for the lowest coin. The E.I.C.’s pysa of 1808 bears the Persian inscription _Bis kás chhar fleūs ast_ (It is 20 kásh, 4 filūs), followed by ‘XX cash.’ So this coin, so dear to the people of Southern India that they cannot look on the modern quarter-anna (the Anglo-Indians’ ‘pice’) otherwise than as a _mookal_, a 3/4 pysa, is really 20 kásh, and the rupee is 200 filūs or 1000 kásh. Here is a decimal division ready for the rupee, for the half-pysa, nominally 1/96 rupee (in 1797 coins it is so inscribed ‘96 to one rupee’), but 1/100 rupee in the bazaar, is similarly inscribed as of ‘10 kásh 2 filūs.’ So the rupee could easily be made of 10 fanams, 100 lesser pysa, 1000 kásh. But the sexdecimal division into annas, and the duodecimal division into pies, are too convenient to be given up for a decimal system.

Footnote 37:

This obvious decimal system of a rupee divided into 10 lesser fanams and 100 pysa would not have appealed to French officials. It is not a decimal system, but the Metric system, that the French scientist requires; the decimal series of measures is only a stalking-horse for the French system abroad. The French do not as a rule care about using it themselves.

The 2 filūs of the half-pysa show that the pysa was once divided into 4 of a small coin (the present pie), the _fils_, an Arabic word probably representing the L. follis.[38]

Footnote 38:

1638. Fluces are 10 to a cozbeg (one halfpenny).—_N.E.D._ In this quotation it seems as if Sir T. Herbert had mistaken the filūs for the 10 kásh of the half-pysa.

_Indian Gold Coinage_

Northern and Central India, the parts more immediately under the Mogul empire, were silver-standard countries. The silver rupee (sicca, = 192 grains) was the standard; and the golden rupee of the same weight, called an Ashráfi, or gold mohur, was valued at 16 rupees, though generally more, according to the market-value of gold. The E.I.C. continued to strike gold mohurs, with halves, thirds and quarters. Other gold coins were current, notably the Venetian zechin, and the approximate correspondence of this coin to the quarter-mohur caused the latter to be commonly known as a ‘chick.’[39]

Footnote 39:

At whist, high play was for ‘Rupee points and a chick on the rub.’

Southern India offers the curious instance of a gold-standard country (a century ago) having changed to a silver standard. The pagoda has disappeared in currency. The beautiful Farūki pagoda of Tippoo is still to be found; and the Venetian zechin with its archaic design, never changed since it was first struck in the thirteenth century, is highly esteemed in the household treasuries of affluent Indians for its great purity. The word zechin or sequin is derived from sikkah, ‘coin.’ The usual Persian inscription on the Mogul coinage, continued by the E.I.C., is _Shah Alam, bádshah gházi, sikkah mubárak_ (Shah Alam, king victorious, coin auspicious).[40]

Footnote 40:

The E.I.C. continued the custom of inscriptions on coins being in Persian, the polite language of Moslem India.

4. DECIMAL CURRENCY

It is scarcely necessary to describe the decimal systems of which the Dollar currency is the type. They have some advantages in numeration with the counterbalancing defects of all decimal series. Division of the dollar stops at a quarter; then there is a drop to 10 cents, and that coin has no quarter. Any thirding can only be approximate.

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