Elementary arithmetic, with brief notices of its history... by Robert Potts.

MONEY.

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coinage1 in England, of which any authentic records can be found, and
it is extraordinary that it took place in the height of his distress for
want of money. This event is related in a MS. Chronicle preserved in
the archives of the City of London, which was probably written at
the time, as the transactions are brought down to 1267. The writer
states, that in this year the king made a penny of the finest gold,
which weighed two sterlings, and willed that it should be current for
20 pence. On the obverse of the gold penny, the king is represented
crowned, and sitting on a chair of state, with a sceptre in his right
hand and a globe in his left. The reverse has the long cross of his
later coinage, with a rose and three small pellets in each quarter.
Scarcely had the king's proclamation been made, and tlhe gold coins
began to circulate, when the City of London made a representation
against them, and obtained another proclamation that no one was
obliged to take them, and whoever did, might bring them to the exchange and receive there the value at which they had been made
current; one halfpenny only being deducted from each, probably for
expense of coinage. In the 49th year of his reign, the gold penny
was raised to 24 pence or two shillings.
From the Conquest till this reign, with the exception of the coins
of Henry II. and John, great changes were made in the inscription
and type of the coins. The portraits of the monarchs were represented either in profile or full, and the crosses were exhibited
under almost every variety of form. The portrait of Henry III. is
invariably full-faced on his coins, the cross consists of double lines;
and the only difference between his earlier and later coinage is, that
in the former the cross is bounded by the inner circle, and has four
pellets in each quarter; while in the latter, it extends to the outer
circle, and the number of the pellets. is reduced to three. In this
description the gold penny forms the only exception. This ornament,
though rude; kept entire possession of the coins until Henry VIIL
introduced heraldic bearings. It then began gradually to give ground,
but was not entirely lost before the time of James I., the end of a
period of nearly 400 years.
Edward I., 1272-1307, succeeded to the turbulent reign of
Henry III., whose ruling passions appear from his doings. Like his
father, he was resolved to have money, and was not over scrupulous
about the methods of obtaining it, from those who possessed it. His
policy consisted in the skill with which he divided the wealthy classes
against each other, and by attacking them singly, and bringing them
by turns to bear upon each other, he so completely subjugated the
whole as to render the power of the crown in his time as absolute as
it had been in the time of the Conqueror. By means of extortion and
confiscations he brought considerable wealth into his treasury. In his
fifth year he had 300 Jews executed in London under the charge of
debasing the coin, and their property he confiscated. And in his
eighteenth year he banished 15,000 Jews from his kingdom, and confiscated all their goods. There was perhaps no class of his subjects,
possessing money, from whom he did not continue to extort it. In his
eighth year he issued a writ, which required all his subjects to shew by
what titles they held their lands. And by this he drew large sums from
1 Both before and after the gold coinage of Henry III., Bezants (so named
from Byzantium) and other foreign gold coins of various values were current in
England.