shilling

shilling, former English and British coin, nominally valued at one-twentieth of a pound sterling, or 12 pence. The shilling was also formerly the monetary unit of Australia, Austria, New Zealand, and Ireland. Today it is the basic monetary unit in Kenya, Somalia, Tanzania, and Uganda.

A silver coin of 12 pence, called a teston in France or a testoon in Britain, was first struck in 1504; it bore a profile likeness of Henry VII of England and was engraved by Alexander Bruchsal. This coin was continued by Henry VIII and was renamed the shilling during the succeeding reign of Edward VI. (The direct origin of the word is obscure; there was an Anglo-Saxon coin termed scilling or scylling, and some German states minted schillings from the 13th century onward.) By 1921 the value of the British shilling had become merely token, for the coin’s silver content had become fractional; in 1947 it became wholly cupronickel (copper-nickel alloy). The shilling was phased out of the British system of coinage beginning in 1971, when a decimal system based on 100 new pence to £1 was introduced.

The schilling was the Austrian currency until 2002, when it was replaced by the euro as the country’s sole currency.

In Kenya the shilling is divided into 100 cents, and a Kenya pound is equivalent to 20 Kenya shillings. The shilling became Kenya’s official monetary unit in 1967, when it replaced the East Africa shilling. The Central Bank of Kenya, established in 1966, has the sole authority to issue banknotes and coins. Banknotes, which feature on the obverse a picture of Daniel arap Moi (president of Kenya from 1978 to 2002), are issued in denominations from 50 to 1,000 shillings. The reverse side of the notes contains images of monuments, buildings, and wildlife. Coin denominations issued range from 10 cents to 40 shillings.