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Halfpenny (British coin)

One old halfpenny
United Kingdom
Value  1480 pound sterling
Mass (1860 - 1967) 5.67 g
Diameter (1860 - 1967) 25.48 mm
Edge Plain
Composition (1672 - 1860) Copper
(1860 - 1967) Bronze
Years of minting 1672 - 1967
Obverse
British pre-decimal halfpenny 1967 obverse.png
Design Profile of the monarch (Elizabeth II design shown)
Designer Mary Gillick
Design date 1953
Reverse
British pre-decimal halfpenny 1967 reverse.png
Design Golden Hind (Britannia on earlier mintages)
Designer Thomas Humphrey Paget
Design date 1937

The British pre-decimal halfpenny (½d) coin, usually simply known as a halfpenny (pronounced /ˈhpəni/ HAY-pə-nee), was a unit of currency that equalled half of a penny or 1/480th of a pound sterling. Originally the halfpenny was minted in copper, but after 1860 it was minted in bronze. It ceased to be legal tender in 1969, in the run-up to decimalisation. The halfpenny featured two different designs on its reverse during its years in circulation. From 1672 until 1936 the image of Britannia appeared on the reverse, and from 1937 onwards the image of the Golden Hind appeared. Like all British coinage, it bore the portrait of the monarch on the obverse.

"Halfpenny" was colloquially written ha’penny, and "1½d" was spoken as "a penny ha’penny" /əˈpɛniˈhpni/ or three ha'pence /θrˈhpəns/. Before Decimal Day in 1971 there were 240 pence in one pound sterling. Twelve pence made a shilling, and twenty shillings made a pound. Values less than a pound were usually written in terms of shillings and pence, e.g. 42 pence would be three shillings and six pence (3/6), pronounced "three and six", whereas 3 shillings even would be "3s" or, on a sign in a shop, "3/-" (the dash usually being written instead of 0 for pence). Values of less than a shilling were simply written in pence, e.g. eightpence would be 8d (the "d" standing for the Latin word denarii (sing. denarius, a common coin in Roman Britain) .


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