Great Britain’s Latin inscriptions – Going, going, gone?

JoesMaName

I was looking at the Royal mints new offerings and noted just how little Latin remains on the current issues, even when compared to just 40 years ago.



Only 5 Latin words remain and of them 4 have been abbreviated down to just one letter and the 5th Regina, has been trimmed to REG.
Do you think they’ll soon follow the L.s.d. standard into history? Should they?

Or is this just a fad? and they’ll be back with a nostalgic vengeance in the near future?

I personally think they'll pull an Arnold.

ProofArtworkonCircs

I remember reading somewhere that it was the Scots' complaint that put the kabosh on BRITT: OMN:
Translated the original 1953 inscription reads in part Elizabeth II, Queen of all the Britons. This implied that Elizabeth I was also and she wasn't. Perhaps they are still smarting over the fact that Elizabeth I executed Mary, Queen of Scots.

Sapyx

I'm missing some cultural context here. What does "pull an Arnold" mean?

As for the Latin... I don't know.

During the Middle ages and Renaissance, it was fashionable to pretend to be "just like the Romans" and issue coins in the same basic style as the Romans did a couple thousand years ago: the ruler's portrait in the centre, with Latin legends around. I believe Britain, Canada and the Vatican City are the last countries in the world to still have coins with designs like this, and given that Latin has now lost it's status as the international language of the learned and educated (having largely been replaced by English), it's certainly anachronistic.

"BRITT: OMN:" (of all the Britons) was formally dropped from the royal titles in 1953, in deference to the fact that (a) not all her subjects were "Britons" and (b) there were some "Britons" (ie the Irish) who were not her subjects.

"REG:" or "Regina" could easily be replaced with the word "Queen" - and would also clear up the confusion some North Americans seem to have, regarding the location of the Royal Canadian Mint (some think "Regina" refers to the city in Saskatchewan).

But "F.D." (Defender of the Faith) is a religious title, and "D:G:" (by the grace of God) is a religious concept. Until and unless the British fully embrace the concept of separation of church and state, those titles will probably remain on the coinage. Being in Latin, the religious connotations are concealed, or at least aren't as blatantly obvious as they would be if they were written in English, making them more acceptable to those users of the coinage who might disagree with those religious sentiments.

ProofArtworkonCircs

We can add one more country to the Latin list - Helvetia. Switzerland has four official modern languages so they compromised and used Latin on the coins.

ProofArtworkonCircs

This has been a most educational thread for me. I had no idea Latin was so out of use on coins today.

But we still have one country left - The United Staes of America with its E PLURIBUS UNUM. I am confused as to what we call this phase today. I think it was once the motto of the USA, but today IN GOD WE TRUST is the official motto.

I suppose I could claim the II after Elizabeth's name on many Comonwealth countries is still Latin since they are Roman numerals.