the Lost story of how US money is referred to as " $ "

did you know ,, the dollar sign,, " $ " has lost the story of WHY we use it?? or , Where it came from....

know-body Really knows..

Some say," Didn't it used to be a "U" and an "S" intertwined?

Old paper currency used to have the 'U' over the 'S', but the arms of the 'U' were bolder than the loop at the bottom. It was easier to hand write it with 2 strokes than a 'U' so it stuck .
but i think that the "$" is older then that..

many stories go back before there was a U. S.,, to Spanish doubloons and how, the $ was meant to mean silver..

We know there are a number of other theories about the origin of the symbol, some with a measure of academic acceptance, others the symbolic equivalent of false etymologies.


it seems odd that in only 200 years (give or take)- we would Definitively lose, something, that at the time, must have been,-- obvious -- to the population..

ETA and THAT is why i placed it "lost Civilizations"

Lets hear what you think!!

you know to be honest i have never really thought about why that symbol is used. i wish the origin story was still around now that i think about it.

reply to post by crimsongod21


i hear yah..

i think Somebody should do a Doctoral Thesis on this!!

It's amazing how in only a few hundred years we could lose track..

did you know SEARS sold CARS?? from a Catalog ?

I think I know this one. The U.S. Constitution specifies "Spanish Milled Dollars" as acceptable currency. I understand that they circulated in the United States as late as the War Between the States. As you may or may not know, a Spanish Milled Dollar is the Eight Reales coin, I have one, reading on the obverse "1781 Carolus III Dei Gratia [by the Grace of God]"; on the reverse it reads "8R P.R. Hispan Etind Rex." This coin is covered in chop marks, so it circulated in the Oriental trade - in fact, these coins were used in trade in most of the world in that era. Of interest here is the reverse, which is stamped with the coat of arms of Spain surmounted by a crown, and flanked by two columns twined with ribbons. I believe the two columns represent Jachin and Boaz, just as in Solomon's temple or your local Masonic hall. The ribbons form an "S" shape as they drape each column, and there are words on the ribbons, but the coin is too worn for me to read them. Eliminate the coat of arms, move the columns together, combine the ribbons, and you get a dollar sign.

BTW, I did know that Sears used to sells cars from their catalog. I have a reprint.

Another thing has become lost in just a few hundred years: the origin of "America." Forget that Italian map-maker - I know who America is really named after.

reply to post by Lazarus Short


STAR for your thoughtful answer.!!

except for the fact we use a SINGLE slash, in our $ ------- i wonder why?

this NEEDS to be solved..

and i agree, it has to have, been around,,, Before there was a U.S.A.

Originally posted by crimsongod21
you know to be honest i have never really thought about why that symbol is used. i wish the origin story was still around now that i think about it.

Yeah, I am the same way. For some reason, the origins of the $ sign was not something I thought about until it was brought up just now.

Hmm, Well,now I wonder...

Just after a quick search I am seeing one of the theories presented in the OP, of it's origins coming from Spanish colonies in the 1770's.

Very interesting.

Keep in mind, this is a wikipedia link, but it does offer several other theories as to the origins of the $ sign.

en.wikipedia.org...

Also,yes,I did know that sears used to sell cars from a catalog. They used to sell just about everything you can think of, from a catalog. Even animals. My library has a few copies of old sears catalogs from long, long ago.

Very cool to look through.

Originally posted by darrman


except for the fact we use a SINGLE slash, in our $ ------- i wonder why?

this NEEDS to be solved..

When I was a kid in school, the dollar sign had two vertical components, not one. It is just a simplification, as is the abbreviation of the one upright on the 4/$ key of my keyboard. It shows an "S" with only a suggestion of a vertical portion at the top and bottom.

How easily history is lost.

I had forgotten how that symbol is used in programming, and I used to do that all the time.

Lost in the sands of time...

Likely not the first time we have forgotten history, nor the last.

No clue...

Origins of words can be found in the Oxford Dictionary

oxforddictionaries.com...

Source

What is the origin of the dollar sign ($)?

Many suggestions have been made about the origin of the dollar symbol $, one of the commonest being that it derives from the figure 8, representing the Spanish 'piece of eight'. However, it actually comes from a handwritten 'ps', an abbreviation for 'peso' in old Spanish-American books. The $ symbol first occurs in the 1770s, in manuscript documents of English-Americans who had business dealings with Spanish-Americans, and it starts to appear in print after 1800.

Didn't the single slash in the $ use to be a double slash, from what I remember?

I think it only became a single slash quite recently (probably with the advent of computers or through lazy accountants figuring people would think what they meant with a single slash).

If memory serves me right on it used to be being a double slash, I would think the merging of U and S would be a very plausible explanation.

Good job, OP, a very thought provoking thread, and different from the "we're going to have a volcano on May 20" normal claptrap. S&F.

reply to post by babybunnies


Sure, we're going to have a volcano on May 20th! We always have a volcano!! Hah!

i thought:

$ = ISIS.....lady of the west......

everything....everything is egyptian...just sayin

peace

reply to post by darrman


I heard it had to do with pieces of eight.Originally was an 8 with a slash through it(if you take an 8 and add / it looks just like as s with /). The two lines was used when you cut a peice of eight in half for change making two slashes over an eight.

I remember the dollar sign having a double slash. What I read at some time is that it came from U and S superimposed. Why or when it changed to one slash, I don't really know.

The dollar sign has its origins in the spanish royal coat of arms, the two vertical bars represent the " pillars of Hercules" or the straights of gibraltar

makes sense the Spanish silver dollar was our first dollar

Very interesting topic. I did a search and came up with this:
projects.exeter.ac.uk...

There are several very interesting theories listed as well as reference to a book titled "A History of Money".
I think the theory I like best from those listed is that a stroke through a letter indicates that the letter is an abbreviation. The S with the slash ($) stands for solidus, originating in Rome in 301 AD representing 1,000 denarii.
I like this theory because it also would explain the symbol we use for cents (¢) with the c being the first letter of the abbreviation.

The site I linked also speaks of the origin of the word "dollar" and is a very interesting read.

Originally posted by Lazarus Short
I think I know this one. The U.S. Constitution specifies "Spanish Milled Dollars" as acceptable currency. I understand that they circulated in the United States as late as the War Between the States. As you may or may not know, a Spanish Milled Dollar is the Eight Reales coin, I have one, reading on the obverse "1781 Carolus III Dei Gratia [by the Grace of God]"; on the reverse it reads "8R P.R. Hispan Etind Rex." This coin is covered in chop marks, so it circulated in the Oriental trade - in fact, these coins were used in trade in most of the world in that era. Of interest here is the reverse, which is stamped with the coat of arms of Spain surmounted by a crown, and flanked by two columns twined with ribbons. I believe the two columns represent Jachin and Boaz, just as in Solomon's temple or your local Masonic hall. The ribbons form an "S" shape as they drape each column, and there are words on the ribbons, but the coin is too worn for me to read them. Eliminate the coat of arms, move the columns together, combine the ribbons, and you get a dollar sign.

BTW, I did know that Sears used to sells cars from their catalog. I have a reprint.

Another thing has become lost in just a few hundred years: the origin of "America." Forget that Italian map-maker - I know who America is really named after.

edit on 10-5-2012 by Lazarus Short because: lah-de-dah

Yup according to this:

"However, a more widely accepted theory nowadays is that the sign owes its origins to the Spanish peso.
One version of this theory is that the standard abbreviation of "peso" was simply "P", but the plural form was a large "P" with a small "s" above it and to its right. This was simplified by retaining only the upward stroke of the "P" and superimposing the "S" upon it. Hence the symbol of the dollar.

See:

Dreyfuss, Henry Symbol source book : an authoritative guide to international graphic symbols. New York : McGraw-Hill, 1972.

If the peso abbreviation theory is the correct one why is the US dollar sign sometimes written with two vertical strokes? A possible explanation is that the best known Spanish Peso coin had two pillars engraved on the reverse side to symbolise the "Pillars of Hercules" at Gibraltar and the words "Plus Ultra" indicating that beyond the Pillars of Hercules there were other lands. That coin was called the Pillar Dollar in the British colonies in North America and the two pillars may have become the two strokes in the Dollar sign."

projects.exeter.ac.uk...

reply to post by darrman



actually "dollar" comes from "Thaler" - en.wikipedia.org...

where often there was a "rod of asclepius" - en.wikipedia.org... icon on it (similar to the caduceus) .. which led to the "$" symbol. the "U" was just people's common habit of not lifting the pen before creating the second line.

the Kundalini - Caduceus - Quetzalcoatl - Rod of asclepius - Moses's brazen serpent on a standard icons (all the same) is human essence of the conscious spirit wound up the human spine .. the vertical line is the spine ..the "S" is the snake-shaped spirit form that is our essence. this is the prime force that causes human interaction and trade, ...and currency is a symbol of that spiritual conscious energy.

Even to this day I hand-write the dollar sign with two vertical lines. This was customary throughout my early education.



I dug into my personal library just for you guys!

All typed personally, no copy/paste. I hope you enjoy putting the pieces of the puzzle together.

(Not to be confused with the Aesclepius Wand)

Caduceus:

The staff considered as a symbol and attribute of the Greek god Hermes and the Roman god Mercury. It is generally represented as having two serpents twined around it in opposite directions, their heads confronting each other.

It is probable that the staves carried by heralds and public criers gave rise to this fable, the fluttering ribbons or fillets tied to the end of the staff, or the green wreaths or boughs which were tied around it, giving the suggestion of living serpents.

Several different fables were invented by late Greek writers to account for the serpents in a miraculous way. One fable tells that Apollo gave his staff to Mercury in consideration of his resigning to him the honor of inventing the lyre. As Mercury entered Arcadia with his wand in his hand, he saw two serpents fighting together; he threw the staff between them, and they immediately wound themselves around it in friendly union. The caduceus is Mercury's peculiar mark of distinction. With this he conducted the shades to the lower world, and from it received the name of Caducifer; yet we find it on ancient coins in the hands of Bacchus, Hercules, Ceres, Venus, and Anubis.

Among the moderns it serves principally as a symbol of commerce. The U.S. Army Medical Corps has adopted it as its emblem.

- The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 5, Pages 135-136
1962 Edition

Mercury:

The English name for the Roman god Mercurius who, with winged hat and sandals, was messenger of the gods and divinity of the market place and commerce. He was originally a Greek God, Hermes.

- The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 18, Page 667
1962 Edition

Hermes:

One of the gods of the ancient Greeks identified by the Romans with their own god Mercurius (Mercury).

The name probably means "he of the stone heap," and the origins of his cult lie in the magical practices connected with the stone heaps which the pre-Homeric Greeks, like other primitive peoples, erected on mountaintops, boundary points, and crossroads. These sites were made sacred by the taboos on contact with the inhospitable outside world and with strangers. Hence the spirit residing in the stone heap, originally represented by a phallic upright stone, became the patron of the activities which took men beyond the boundary into the wasteland: shepherding, hunting, traveling, embassies, trade.

His connection with magic set the tone for his personality in myth: he was regarded both as a trickster and as a culture-hero, these being the dark and light sides of the magician.

With the development of urban life in Greece some of the activities connected with Hermes were transferred from the perimeter to the center of the city-state: Hermes, as the god of trade, became the god of agora (city market); as the god of ways he presided over city streets and doorways.

In this urbanized context the stone-heap symbol was replaced by the herm- a square-cut block of stone, surmounted by an anthropomorphic head of the god, and ornamented with the phallus, the square-cut shape and the phallus being vestiges of his primitive origins.

This one part of his cult was in the wastelands, while the other was in the market place. This split is reflected in mythology: on the one hand he is the god who was born in the mountains of Arcadia, the companion of the nymphs and other deities of the wilds; on the other hand he is the friend of shopkeepers, portrayed by Aristophanes as the very type of "city slicker" or "man of the agora."

When in the Homeric epics the spirit world of primitive Greek religion was transformed into a hierarchy of anthropomorphic deities articulated on the model of the patriarchal household and the Mycenaean kingship, Hermes was subordinated to Zeus, the father and king, as his servant and more specifically as his messenger and herald. Hence in Greek poetry, drama and art he is characteristically depicted with the broad-brimmed hat and stout sandals of the traveler.

At the same time his primitive personality as magician, trickster and culture-hero was not obliterated. In Greek art his magical powers are suggested by wings attached to his sandals or cap, and by the magic wand, or herald's staff (Latin caduceus) in his hand.

Numerous myths describe his aptitude for trickery, notably Homeric Hymn to Hermes, which tells how Hermes, on the very day of his birth, stole the cattle of Apollo, his them cunningly, and did not give them up until he had struck a shrewd bargain with Apollo, gaining for himself recognition as a god of cattle on par with Apollo.

In ritual, too, he was invoked both as "the Trickster" and also as "the Giver of Good" (that is, the culture-hero). Both as magician and as messenger he was qualified to control the souls of the dead and guide them to Hades, and so he became known as the "Conductor of Souls." He also has a role in the art (and tricks) of love, and hence a connection with Aphrodite-- a connection which gave rise to the figure of Hermaphroditus.

Hermes' functional connection, as culture-hero, with craftsmanship and trade made him the patron deity of the merchants and craftsmen, whose struggle for equality with the aristocracy looms large in early Greek history. This struggle is projected into the mythical conflict between Hermes and Apollo (the aristocrat of Olympus) in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes.

When the Greek middle class gained access to higher culture, they attributed to their patron deity Hermes cultural functions which had previously been monopolized by Apollo. Hermes became a god of music, rhetoric, and gymnastic, and in art he lost the appearance of a working man and became (like Apollo) an ideal type of cultured young gentleman, as in the famous Hermes of Praxiteles.

Under the name of Mercury the Roman appropriated the Greek conception of Hermes without making any substantial additions.

- The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 14, Pages 131-132
1962 Edition