# ancient or mythical currencies question

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ancient-or-mythical-currencies-question/641345>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [November 17, 2012, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ancient-or-mythical-currencies-question/641345 "2012-11-17T20:32:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2012, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ancient-or-mythical-currencies-question/641345/21 "2012-11-19T20:42:19Z")

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> [@Heracles](#):
>
> …
> 
> And what other currency was that? Well, there’s debate on that as well. Some say it was the English pound or French livre, some talk about another currency called the _piastre_ (which is still used today to designate a dollar up here).

Could this have been the old Spanish/Mexican peso/dollar/piece of eight? IIRC, when the USD was first introduced it was pegged to the Spanish piece of eight (which was worth 8 _reales_) at 1..1, so one _real_ was worth 1/8 of a USD. The real coin was colloquially known as a _bit_ in some English speaking areas, and two of them were equal to a “real” US Mint issued quarter, and 25 cents became colloquially known as _two bits_, hence the expression.

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