Wizard Currency

[Maple_and_PheonixFeather]

The moose doesn't strike me as a particularly French animal. I'm pretty sure that apart from zoos, France is definitely not one of the moose's natural habitats.

What exactly is a Fauvre?

If you want a semi-rational way to value these coins that still has a bit of Harry Potter flair, I would recommend a seven-base system: seven souris go into an Élan, and seven Élans make a Fauvre. Wizards seem to like the number seven.

I like your number system. Ah! I didn't know France didn't have moose, I kind of assumed they did as there's a Quebec translation and a France translation. I just think that it sounds cool

Un Fauvre really just means wild beast. I found it in le Petit Prince, and liked the sound of it.

I suppose you could exchange Élan with aigle.

[Masquerade]

I think it should be taken into account that the wizard community is much smaller than the Muggle community. With a low population, I don't think it would be reasonable to have so many different types of currencies. Different continents might have different currencies, but I think most of Europe would share, Canada and the US would definitely share (and maybe with the rest of the commonwealth), South America would, a lot of Eastern Asia would, etc. Different countries might have different names for currency, though. For example, a sickle in France might be called a "sique".

[AidaLuthien]

I think it should be taken into account that the wizard community is much smaller than the Muggle community. With a low population, I don't think it would be reasonable to have so many different types of currencies. Different continents might have different currencies, but I think most of Europe would share, Canada and the US would definitely share (and maybe with the rest of the commonwealth), South America would, a lot of Eastern Asia would, etc. Different countries might have different names for currency, though. For example, a sickle in France might be called a "sique".

I disagree completely. The wizarding communities seem highly isolated from one another, and one of the markers of independence is a separate currency. As Tim pointed out earlier, the Greek city-states all had different currencies and they weren't particularly big and they were all in the same relatively small region of the world.

There don't seem to be many international bodies like the Muggle European Union, so there would be no basis for a European-wide currency. Without imperialism there would be no basis for the Commonwealth or the Francophonee, not that I want to get into that argument in a thread on currency.

For that matter, Muggle China historically has had a lot of problems with standardizing currency, and that's just one country. After the first federal bank was killed, all the different states in the United States printed their own money.

[Karaley Dargen]

How would wizards handle very large money transactions, like in buying houses, for instance? As far as we know from canon, the Galleon is the single largest monetary unit in Britain, so if you want to buy something that costs 10,000 Galleons, you need to have 10,000 individual Galleon coins on you! This sounds unbelievably heavy, bulky, and unwieldy given how many coins would need to be counted.

So do you think wizards just suffer through this and painstakingly count massive piles of Galleons from a big chest they would have to lug around, or could there be a more streamlined and convenient process for handling expensive purchases?

Tim the Enchanter

Well, that'd go through Gringotts, I expect. You tell them to transfer money from one vault to the other, and they do it. I don't really see a problem there... I also imagine there might be spells for those things, but really, I expect it'd work through Gringotts. Every wizard in England seems to have a vault there.

[Tim the Enchanter]

How would wizards handle very large money transactions, like in buying houses, for instance? As far as we know from canon, the Galleon is the single largest monetary unit in Britain, so if you want to buy something that costs 10,000 Galleons, you need to have 10,000 individual Galleon coins on you! This sounds unbelievably heavy, bulky, and unwieldy given how many coins would need to be counted.

So do you think wizards just suffer through this and painstakingly count massive piles of Galleons from a big chest they would have to lug around, or could there be a more streamlined and convenient process for handling expensive purchases?

Tim the Enchanter

[DeadManSeven]

Signs letters of mark from the goblins. One wizard gives an official bit of paper to the other, then they take that bit of paper and the goblins use those minecarts to transport the gold. For a fee, of course.

[Kitty]

One point about the possibility of multiple countries using the same currency - galleons, sickles and knuts didn't necessarily originate in Britain. They could well be a translation or even just what the word sounded a bit like taken from another language.

Another thing to remember is that wizarding world borders aren't the same as Muggle ones. In GoF, Fudge is Minister of Magic for Ireland as well as the rest of the UK, so presumably Ireland remains part of the union. The same is likely to be true for other areas around the world - after all, pureblood wizards and witches seem to wield a lot of power and are far less likely to be influenced by what the muggle world is doing.

I think different wizard countries would have different currencies, I just think you can and should be a bit more inventive about what is a country.

[Tim the Enchanter]

One point about the possibility of multiple countries using the same currency - galleons, sickles and knuts didn't necessarily originate in Britain. They could well be a translation or even just what the word sounded a bit like taken from another language.

I think Sickle could be a bastardisation of the ancient near-eastern "Shekel." Either that, or the Sickle is literally named after the agricultural tool.

Now that the issue of etymology is brought up, why do these coins have these names? A galleon is a multi-masted sailing vessel with square and lateen rigs, developed from the carrack. The Spanish treasure ships were all galleons, which might be the inspiration behind the name, but why would wizards name a coin after this Muggle form of transportation? Could English wizards have had fun robbing the hapless Muggle treasure ships and named their gold coins "Galleons" as a joke?

I already mentioned the Sickle, but what about the Knut? The only thing that comes to mind when I hear "Knut" is King Cnut ("Ca-nute"), a viking king of England in the 11th century. Would wizards recognise the authority of a Muggle king at that time, and possibly name a coin after him? Could Knut be named after something totally different?

Also, what would these coins look like?

Tim the Enchanter

[Maple_and_PheonixFeather]

I think Sickle could be a bastardisation of the ancient near-eastern "Shekel." Either that, or the Sickle is literally named after the agricultural tool.

I personally really like the idea of Shekel...personally...wasn't it a silver coin?

A sickle is also " a group of stars in the constellation Leo, likened to this implement in formation." Could it make sense that it is named after astronamy...that seems wizard like...
Also, sickle descripes a shape, like a cresent moon.

Now that the issue of etymology is brought up

This sounds interesting I love etymology...

A galleon is a multi-masted sailing vessel with square and lateen rigs, developed from the carrack. The Spanish treasure ships were all galleons, which might be the inspiration behind the name, but why would wizards name a coin after this Muggle form of transportation? Could English wizards have had fun robbing the hapless Muggle treasure ships and named their gold coins "Galleons" as a joke?

Like pirate ships?
Maybe all pirates were pirates...just kidding...hmmm, I always think of the word gallon, but I'm pretty sure that it has nothing to do with that

Could Knut be named after something totally different?

Here I think of like nuts and bolts, but could it be a play on words on JKR's part, like, it's small peanuts or however that phrase goes (like not worth much)?

Also, what would these coins look like?

Oh dear, I think I always accociate them with looking like Muggle money:
Knuts are bronze, so I kind of see them as pennies, sickles are silver, so I see them as dimes, and Galleons are gold...so I see them like a Canadian one-dollar coin (loonie?) Haha, there is a possibitlity that sickles are well sickle shaped

[SingingWren]

Yeah, about the coin shapes, I agree that I picture the knuts like pennies, but sickles I picture to be about the size and shape of those old silver dollars that you still find lying around occasionally. And Galleons... well, I've always pictured them to be about the same size and shape as the Olympic gold medals used in the 1988 Calgary games. That's probably wildly inaccurate, but it's in the impression I got from the books.