A coin is a small object, usually round and flat, used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in order to facilitate trade. They are most often issued by a government. Coins often have images, numerals, or text on them. The faces of coins or medals are sometimes called the obverse and the reverse, referring to the front and back sides, respectively. The obverse of a coin is commonly called heads, because it often depicts the head of a prominent person, and the reverse is known as tails.
The standard circulating coinage of the United Kingdom, British Crown Dependencies and British Overseas Territories is denominated in pennies and pounds sterling, and ranges in value from one penny sterling to two pounds. Since decimalisation, on 15 February 1971, the pound has been divided into 100 pence. Before decimalisation, twelve pence made a shilling, and twenty shillings made a pound.
The British florin, or two-shilling piece, was a coin worth 1⁄10 of one pound, or 24 pence. It was issued from 1849 until 1967, with a final issue for collectors dated 1970. It was the last coin circulating immediately prior to decimalisation to be demonetised, in 1993, having for a quarter of a century circulated alongside the ten-pence piece, identical in specifications and value.
Byzantine currency, money used in the Eastern Roman Empire after the fall of the West, consisted of mainly two types of coins: gold solidi and hyperpyra and a variety of clearly valued bronze coins. By the 15th century, the currency was issued only in debased silver stavrata and minor copper coins with no gold issue. The Byzantine Empire established and operated several mints throughout its history. Aside from the main metropolitan mint in the capital, Constantinople, a varying number of provincial mints were also established in other urban centres, especially during the 6th century.
The dime, in United States usage, is a ten-cent coin, one tenth of a United States dollar, labeled formally as "one dime". The denomination was first authorized by the Coinage Act of 1792.
Roman Republican currency is the coinage struck by the various magistrates of the Roman Republic, to be used as legal tender. In modern times, the abbreviation RRC, "Roman Republican Coinage" originally the name of a reference work on the topic by Michael H. Crawford, has come to be used as an identifying tag for coins assigned a number in that work, such as RRC 367.
The lira was the currency of Italy between 1861 and 2002. It was introduced by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy in 1807 at par with the French franc, and was subsequently adopted by the different states that would eventually form the Kingdom of Italy in 1861. It was subdivided into 100 centesimi, which means "hundredths" or "cents". The lira was also the currency of the Albanian Kingdom from 1941 to 1943.
The Coinage of India began anywhere between early 1st millennium BCE to the 6th century BCE, and consisted mainly of copper and silver coins in its initial stage. The coins of this period were Karshapanas or Pana. A variety of earliest Indian coins, however, unlike those circulated in West Asia, were stamped bars of metal, suggesting that the innovation of stamped currency was added to a pre-existing form of token currency which had already been present in the Janapadas and Mahajanapada kingdoms of the Early historic India. The kingdoms that minted their own coins included Gandhara, Kuntala, Kuru, Magadha, Panchala, Shakya, Surasena, Surashtra and Vidarbha etc.
There have been three sets of coins in Ireland since independence. In all three, the coin showed a Celtic harp on the obverse. The pre-decimal coins of the Irish punt had realistic animals on the reverse; the decimal coins retained some of these but featured ornamental birds on the lower denominations; and the euro coins used the common design of the euro currencies. The pre-decimal and original decimal coins were of the same dimensions as the same-denomination British coins, as the Irish punt was in currency union with the British pound sterling. British coins were widely accepted in Ireland, and conversely to a lesser extent. In 1979 Ireland joined the Exchange Rate Mechanism and the Irish punt left parity with sterling; coin designs introduced after this differed between the two countries.
The British farthing was a British coin worth a quarter of an old penny. It ceased to be struck after 1956 and was demonetised from 1 January 1961.
This glossary of numismatics is a list of definitions of terms and concepts relevant to numismatics and coin collecting, as well as sub-fields and related disciplines, with concise explanations for the beginner or professional.
Silver coins are one of the oldest mass-produced form of coinage. Silver has been used as a coinage metal since the times of the Greeks; their silver drachmas were popular trade coins. The ancient Persians used silver coins between 612–330 BC. Before 1797, British pennies were made of silver.
The 10 euro cent coin (€0.10) has a value of one tenth of a euro and is composed of an alloy called Nordic gold. All euro coins have a common reverse side and country-specific national sides. The coin has been used since 2002, with the present common side design dating from 2007.
The shilling, informally called a "bob", was a type of silver coinage issued by the Commonwealth of Australia, that circulated prior to the decimalisation of Australian coinage. The Australian shilling was derived from the British pre-decimal sterling pound system and was first issued following the passing of the Australian Coinage Act 1909, which established Australia's first formal currency system. The shilling was issued as part of Australia's silver coinage, which included the two-shilling (florin), the sixpence and the threepence. The shilling was minted from 1910 until 1963. During this period there was one significant modification to the design of the Australian shilling, the change in its reverse design, which occurred in 1938 when the design was altered from the Australian coat of arms (1910–1936) to the visage of a Merino ram's head (1938–1963).
Before the introduction of the euro, the current eurozone members issued their own individual national coinage, most of which featured mint marks, privy marks and/or mint master marks. These marks have been continued as a part of the national designs of the euro coins, as well. This article serves to list the information about the various types of identifying marks on euro coins, including engraver and designer initials and the unique edge inscriptions found on the €2 coins.
Medieval Bulgarian coinage were the coins minted by the Bulgarian Emperors during the Middle Ages at the time of the Second Bulgarian Empire.
The one mil coin was the smallest denomination of the Hong Kong dollar from 1863 to 1866, after this date it was no longer issued but may have circulated much longer. Its value was one tenth of a cent, or a thousandth of a dollar. It was minted by the Royal Mint, it features the Royal cypher of "VR", of the reigning monarch Queen Victoria at the time, but didn't feature a profile of the face of the monarch as all other coins did, due to the hole in the middle.
Illyrian coinage which began in the 6th century BC continued up to the 1st century of Roman rule. It was the southern Illyrians who minted the first coins followed by the northern Illyrian during the Roman era. Illyrian coins have also been found in other areas apart from Illyria, such ancient Macedonia, Italy, Greece, Asia Minor and Egypt.
The Post-Mauryan coinage of Gandhara refers to the period of coinage production in Gandhara, following the breakup of the Maurya Empire. When Mauryan central power disappeared, several small independent entities were formed, which started to strike their own coins, defining a period of Post-Mauryan coinage that ends with the rise of the Gupta Empire in the 4th century CE. This phenomenon was particularly precocious and significant in the area of Gandhara in the northwest, and more particularly in the city of Taxila, in modern-day Pakistan.
The coinage of Suessa concerns coins minted in Suessa, a city in ancient Campania inhabited by the Aurunci, an ancient Italic population. The city minted coins in the period between 268 B.C. and the Second Punic War.
for the obverse and "reverse" 
for the reverse. The "two-sided" 
, "mirror" 
, and "equal" 
symbols are further used to describe the relationship between the obverse and reverse sides of a flag.![On a Tetradrachma of Athens, struck c. 490 BC, the head of Athena, (left), is regarded as the obverse because of its larger scale and because it is a portrait head; the entire owl is depicted in a smaller scale on the reverse. Legend: AThE[NAI]O[N], ie of Athenians. Tetradrachma fran Aten (omkr 490 fKr, ur Nordisk familjebok).png](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/24/Tetradrachma_fr%C3%A5n_Aten_%28omkr_490_fKr%2C_ur_Nordisk_familjebok%29.png/220px-Tetradrachma_fr%C3%A5n_Aten_%28omkr_490_fKr%2C_ur_Nordisk_familjebok%29.png)
![Solidus of Justinian II after 705. Christ is on the obverse (left), the emperor on the reverse. Legend: D[OMI]N[US] IHS[US] CH[RI]S[TOS] REX RAGNANTIUM / D[OMI]N[US] IUSTINIANUS MULTUS A[NNI]. Solidus-Justinian II-Christ b-sb1413.jpg](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e2/Solidus-Justinian_II-Christ_b-sb1413.jpg/220px-Solidus-Justinian_II-Christ_b-sb1413.jpg)
