, the shilling was once used on every inhabited continent. This two-shilling piece was minted for
British West Africa.
Australian shillings Australian shillings, twenty of which made up one
Australian pound, were first issued in 1910, with the Australian
coat of arms on the reverse and King
Edward VII on the face. The coat of arms design was retained through the reign of King
George V until a new ram's head design was introduced for the coins of King
George VI. This design continued until the last year of issue in 1963. On February 14th, 1966, Australia's currency was
decimalised and the shilling was replaced by a
ten cent coin (Australian), where 10 shillings made up one
Australian dollar. The slang term for a shilling coin in Australia was "deener". The slang term for a shilling as currency unit was "bob", the same as in the
United Kingdom. After 1966, shillings continued to circulate, as they were replaced by ten-cent coins of the same size and weight.
South African shillings The South African shilling was introduced in 1923, and used until 1965. Struck in silver, it bore the reigning monarch's head and titles on the obverse, and the figure of Hope on the reverse. When decimal currency was introduced in 1961, the shilling was replaced with a ten-cent coin, of similar design (but with the (supposed) portrait of
Jan van Riebeeck instead of that of
Queen Elizabeth II), and the two currencies were used interchangeably until 1965.
New Zealand shilling New Zealand shillings, twenty of which made up one
New Zealand pound, were first issued in 1933 and featured the image of a Maori warrior carrying a taiaha "in a warlike attitude" on the reverse. In 1967, New Zealand's currency was
decimalised and the shilling was replaced by a ten-cent coin of the same size and weight. Ten-cent coins minted through the remainder of the 1960s included the legend "ONE SHILLING" on the reverse. Smaller ten-cent coins were introduced in 2006.
Maltese shillings The shilling (, pl.
xelini) was used in
Malta, prior to
decimalisation in 1972, and had a face value of five Maltese
cents.
Ceylonese shillings In
British Ceylon, a shilling (, ) was equivalent to eight
fanams. With the replacement of the
rixdollar by the
rupee in 1852, a shilling was deemed to be equivalent to half a rupee. On the decimalisation of the currency in 1969, a shilling was deemed to be equivalent to 50 Ceylon cents. The term continued to be used colloquially until the late 20th century.
East African shillings where the currency is called shilling. The
East African shilling was in use in the
British colonies and
protectorates of
British Somaliland,
Kenya,
Tanganyika,
Uganda and
Zanzibar from 1920, when it replaced the
rupee, until after those countries became independent, and in
Tanzania after that country was formed by the merger of Tanganyika and Zanzibar in 1964. Upon independence in 1960, the East African shilling in the
British Somaliland and the
Somali somalo in the
Trust Territory of Somalia were replaced by the
Somali shilling. In 1966, the East African Monetary Union broke up, and the member countries replaced their currencies with the
Kenyan shilling, the
Ugandan shilling and the
Tanzanian shilling, respectively. Though all these currencies have different values at present, there were plans to reintroduce the
East African shilling as a new common currency by 2009, although this has not come about.
North America In the
thirteen British colonies that became the United States in 1776, British money was often in circulation. Each colony issued its
own paper money, with
pounds, shillings, and pence used as the standard
units of account. Some coins were minted in the colonies, such as
the pine tree shilling in the
Massachusetts Bay Colony. After the United States adopted the
dollar as its unit of currency and accepted the
gold standard, one British shilling was worth 24 US
cents. Due to ongoing shortages of US coins in some regions, shillings continued to circulate well into the nineteenth century. Shillings are described as the standard monetary unit throughout the autobiography of
Solomon Northup (1853) and mentioned several times in the
Horatio Alger Jr. story
Ragged Dick (1868). Prices in an 1859 advertisement in a Chicago newspaper were given in dollars and shillings. In
British North America, £sd currencies were in use both during the French period (
New France livre) and after the
British conquest (
Canadian pound). Between the 1760s and 1840s in
Lower Canada, both French and British-based pounds coexisted as units of account, the French livre being close in value to the British shilling. A variety of coinage circulated. By 1858, a decimal
Canadian dollar came into use in the
Province of Canada. Other parts of British North America decimalized shortly afterwards and
Canadian Confederation in 1867 passed control of currency to the federal government.
Somali shilling The Somali shilling is the official
currency of
Somalia. It is subdivided into 100
cents (English),
senti (Somali, also سنت) or
centesimi (Italian). The Somali shilling has been the currency of parts of Somalia since 1921, when the
East African shilling was introduced to the former
British Somaliland protectorate. Following independence in 1960, the
somalo of
Italian Somaliland and the East African shilling (which were equal in value) were replaced at par in 1962 by the Somali shilling. Names used for the denominations were cent, centesimo (plural: centesimi) and سنت (plurals: سنتيمات and سنتيما) together with shilling, scellino (plural: scellini) and شلن. That same year, the
Banca Nazionale Somala issued notes for 5, 10, 20 and 100 scellini/shillings. In 1975, the
Bankiga Qaranka Soomaaliyeed (Somali National Bank) introduced notes for 5, 10, 20 and 100 shilin/shillings. These were followed in 1978 by notes of the same denominations issued by the
Bankiga Dhexe Ee Soomaaliya (
Central Bank of Somalia). 50 shilin/shillings notes were introduced in 1983, followed by 500 shilin/shillings in 1989 and 1000 shilin/shillings in 1990. Also in 1990 there was an attempt to reform the currency at 100 to 1, with new banknotes of 20 and 50 new shilin prepared for the redenomination. Following the breakdown in central authority that accompanied the
civil war, which began in the early 1990s, the value of the Somali shilling was disrupted. The Central Bank of Somalia, the nation's monetary authority, also shut down operations. Rival producers of the local currency, including autonomous regional entities such as the
Somaliland territory, subsequently emerged. Somalia's newly established
Transitional Federal Government revived the defunct Central Bank of Somalia in the late 2000s. In terms of financial management, the monetary authority is in the process of assuming the task of both formulating and implementing monetary policy.
Somaliland shilling The
Somaliland shilling is the official currency of
Somaliland, a self-declared republic that is internationally recognised as an
autonomous region of
Somalia. The currency is not recognised as
legal tender by the international community, and it currently has no official
exchange rate. It is regulated by the
Bank of Somaliland, Somaliland's
central bank. Although the authorities in Somaliland have attempted to bar usage of the Somali shilling, Somalia's official currency is still in circulation in some regions.
Other Elsewhere in the former British Empire, forms of the word
shilling remain in informal use. In
Vanuatu and
Solomon Islands,
selen is used in
Bislama and
Pijin to mean "money"; in
Malaysia,
syiling (pronounced like
shilling) means "coin". In
Egypt and
Jordan the
shillin () is equal to 1/20 (five
qirshes — , ) of the
Egyptian pound or the
Jordanian dinar. In
Belize, the term
shilling is commonly used to refer to twenty-five cents. ==Other countries==