Unit of account

The pound, shilling, and pence schemata as the unit of account began prior to the Norman Conquest, in the Anglo-Saxon period, when the only coin in existence was the silver penny. With rare and temporary exception, the penny was the only coin in circulation until the late thirteenth century. The term “penny” is believed to emanate from a coin issued by King Penda of Mercia in the seventh country. In the ninth century the penny was in all the Saxon kingdoms and 240 pennies always constituted a pound. Even though the weight of the penny varied across kingdoms and over time, “the intention was that the pound weight of silver and the pound of money should be the same and that the pound of silver should be minted into 240 pennies” (Feavearyear, 1963, pp. 7–8). The abbreviation for penny, d., is from the Latin denarius (a Roman coin and unit of account), which until the fourteenth century meant both a pennyweight and the face value of the penny coin.

According to Feavearyear, the Saxons may have applied the term “scilling,” later “shilling” and meaning “a piece cut off,” to pieces of broken silver added to the scale to compensate for underweight coin. Over time, the shilling became equal to a definite number of pennies, eventually 12, the preference of William the Conqueror.