Sounds OK to me too (Northern England background). But it is specifically pre-decimal: £1 2p is never “one and two” in my experience.

I agree, one and two would always be interpreted as one shilling and tuppence. You’d have to say one pound and tuppence or a pound and tuppence for £1 2d. Of course, for one pound one shilling you’d say a guinea, even though the coin itself hadn’t been minted since 1814. I remember suits were always priced in guineas for some reason and the term is still used in horse-racing circles and in the sale of rams. That last one is a revelation to me - see the Wikipedia article, the link to which I am unable to provide owing to Expression Engine’s inability to handle urls containing brackets.

That last one is a revelation to me - see the Wikipedia article, the link to which I am unable to provide owing to Expression Engine’s inability to handle urls containing brackets.

How about using a shorten url? http://tinyurl.com/csmdz5

My mother worked for Christies, the fine art auctioneers, in the 1970s and ‘80s, and they always expressed estimates and prices in guineas. We always supposed that this was just another way to bamboozle buyers in the sale room - not only did you have to remember that you’d have to pay the hammer price plus the auctioneer’s percentage and keep calculating what that would be, you also had to remember that you weren’t bidding in pounds but in guineas; which, when you’re bidding on a Van Gogh or a Velazquez, can make quite a difference.

Oecolampadius - 05 March 2013 10:25 AM

That last one is a revelation to me - see the Wikipedia article, the link to which I am unable to provide owing to Expression Engine’s inability to handle urls containing brackets.

How about using a shorten url? http://tinyurl.com/csmdz5

Now why didn’t I think of that? A sterling suggestion, oeco, thank you!

[quote[My mother worked for Christies, the fine art auctioneers, in the 1970s and ‘80s, and they always expressed estimates and prices in guineas.

It was also a popular unit in the gambling sphere.

People must have been weird in the olden days, thinking 252 pennies was a nice round number.

A note from the OED: The guinea is the ordinary unit for a professional fee and for a subscription to a society or institution; the prices obtained for works of art, racehorses, and sometimes landed property, are also stated in guineas.

The guinea is the ordinary unit for a professional fee

Depends on the profession, Doc. When I was a student in Liverpool, aeons ago, the professional lasses on Lime Street would settle for ten bob* (Understand, this is only hearsay. I never engaged the young ladies’ services - their appearance was a convincing argument for chastity). On second thoughts, it depends on the social stratum, too. I remember [correction: I think I remember] an episode from Halliday Sutherland’s The Arches of the Years (1932) where a top-drawer young lady submits a quotation: “The fee is five guineas”. So I suppose you and the OED are right, after all. As usual.

*(Half a guinea less a tanner, if we want to be pedantic)