Penny for them, not quite...

My favourite British bird in the Wren, tiny and darting and everywhere and nowhere all at once. Perhaps that is why I like farthings so much.

Hard to believe that farthings were legal tender when I was born, they were though. The farthing was legal tender until 31st December, 1960 although the very last ones were minted in 1956 the year before my birth.

I was given £1 worth of farthings as a christening present by my great aunt Audrey, all 960 of them. Yes there were 960 farthings to the pound, they were a tiny sum of money. So tiny and annoying that in 1953 the Times reported that a bus conductor refused to accept eight farthings for a two penny bus fare, and that a newspaper vendor had become abusive when offered six farthings for a newspaper; even though the farthing was still legal tender in sums up to one shilling at the time.

I kept those farthings in an old wooden money box for years. I still have a few, but not all of them. I guess that they are down the back various settees and under the floorboards of the variety of houses I’ve lived in over the years.

If you’ve never seen a farthing the current penny coin is almost the same size as the last minted farthings but is worth 9.6 times as much.

I wonder what a farthing could buy today?