The Value of Money in Dodger
Categories: [ Science ]
Terry Pratchett's Dodger is said to take place in the first quarter of the Victorian Era. We'll assume it is the year 1840. According to the National Archive's currency converter, 1 £ in 1840 is worth about 45 GBP in 2005.
Moreover, the same source indicates that with 100 GBP (about 2£ 5s) you could buy 11 days work of a craftsman wages in the building trade, 3 stones (42 lbs) of wool or 1 quarter (28 lbs) of wheat. As a reference, a person's daily needs in energy are equivalent to about 2 lbs of wheat (representing 2950 kcal according to Wikipedia).
These are the coins mentionned in Dodger:
- Guinea: 21s = 252d (47.25 GBP)
- Sovereign: 1 £ = 20s = 240d (45 GBP)
- Crown: 5s = 60d (11.25 GBP)
- Half-Crown: 2.5s = 30d (5.63 GBP) (about 1.5 lbs of wheat)
- Shilling: 1s = 12d (2.25 GBP)
- Sixpence: 1/2s = 6d (1.13 GBP)
- Groat: 4d (0.75 GBP)
- Thruppence: 3d (0.56 GBP)
- Penny: 1d (0.19 GBP)
- Half-penny: 1/2d (0.10 GBP)
- Farthing: 1/4d (0.05 GBP)
A day worth of a craftman's wages is therfore 4s, which could buy 2.5 lbs of wheat or 4 lbs of wool.
[ Posted on December 7th, 2013 at 18:06 | no comment | permanent link ]
