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Multilingual Coins


jlueke

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Coins depicting two or more languages are very common. For instance in one country many coins use the phrase E Pluribus Unum along with United States. Many coins state DEI GRATIA along with more words in the vernacular. Later Roman coins sometimes mixed Latin and Greek or wrote Latin phrases with Greek letters.

 

A few coins were more interesting in that they repeated the same phrase in multiple languages. This seems to have happened especially during times of conquest. There are Arab coins with Persian writing and a Mongol coin with Arab, Persian, and Mongol scripts. Does anyone out there collect these? Are there many out there?

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Does anyone out there collect these? Are there many out there?

It's a very intertesting area to collect. I have some colonial coins with bi-lingual legend: english/chinese, portuuese/chinese, german/arabic, german/russian, french/arabic... My next target is a german/chinese legend.

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Oh wow Jose, now I think I have to find those coins. :ninja: Are those available cheaply? Let me know if you happened to have spares ;)

 

I actually taught you had them..., and yes, they are cheap (around 1 Euro a piece), don't have any spares but those coins are readily available from dealers, just send me a PM if you're interested.

 

Jose ;)

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953541.jpg

This is a Bhutan 3 Ngultrums I picked up recently, that they were nice enough to put an English legend on in addition to the native language.

 

This one is from Syria, although Lebanon produced an almost identical coin. French and an Arabic language.

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India has had many coins in more than one language- their current issues have Indian and English on them. This isn't a current issue.

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This is a good one- Eritrea/Ethiopia as an Italian Colony. Arabic, Ethiopian, and Italian.

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The coveted German Kiaochou coin. I've had interested persons in buying; but I'm just not looking to sell it right now.

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Belgian coins tend to be multilingual. :ninja: The €2 Treaty of Rome commem from 2007 is a nice example - Latin at the top, country name in French, Dutch, German at the bottom:

 

image8393.gif

 

Or take this year's Declaration of Human Rights piece: motto in English (part of the official logo), plus the three country name versions.

 

2-Euro-2008.jpg

 

Here is another interesting piece - a German collector coin (€10 "documenta" art exhibition 2002) with the edge inscription in nine different languages:

 

505px-Deutsche_Muenzen_-_dokumenta,_Randpraegung.jpg

 

Christian

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Two more. First, a 20 heller/haleru coin from Nazi Germany's "Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia". Other denominations in that series: 10h, 50h and 1 crown.

 

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Many coins from Cyprus are trilingual - Greek, Turkish, English. On the current circulation coins you have the country name in Greek and Turkish; the new €5 collector coin has the country name in three languages again, and the occasion in Greek only.

 

South Africa has eleven official languages, and while it is not possible to use all of them on every coin :ninja: they use one or two (depends on the denomination) according to some rotation system. Here are two different 2 rand coins, one from 2006, one from 2007:

 

151-2r06.jpg

 

151-2r07.jpg

 

Christian

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This post made me wonder about something similar. I just wonder how many coins are and have been made using the old Roman Numbering system. I can't remember any off hand. Anyone know of any besides the Old Romans that is?

 

Do you mean anno domini years dated in Roman Numerals?

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Do you mean anno domini years dated in Roman Numerals?

GEE, NO. I was meaning the ones with the BC dates in Roman Numbers. You know, III BC or LCII BC. :ninja:

Why what fun would it be finding a coin with AD after the date?

What I mean is simply wondering if that system is used on coins anywhere. Such as a XX piece or a II cent piece. NO AD is required.

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GEE, NO. I was meaning the ones with the BC dates in Roman Numbers. You know, III BC or LCII BC. :ninja:

Why what fun would it be finding a coin with AD after the date?

What I mean is simply wondering if that system is used on coins anywhere. Such as a XX piece or a II cent piece. NO AD is required.

Like the 3 cent piece?

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Basically that applies to the Finnish euro coins too: Those pieces that have a country name have it in two languages. See the edge inscription of the €2 coins for example. Or take the Treaty of Rome commem (€2 2007) - country name in both languages on the obverse, occasion in Finnish on the obverse, in Swedish on the edge.

 

And all euro collector coins (€5, €10, etc.) say SUOMI FINLAND anyway. An interesting case is the Åland/Ahvenanmaa demilitarization coin which also has, on one side, both language versions of the country name. On the other side you have the occasion in Swedish, a reference to Åland's autonomous status - and in this case the edge has the Finnish version ...

 

Christian

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Very interesting thread. I'm sure I have some multilingual coins in my collection, but I've never really focused on it before.

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