From squirrel pelt to Euro

Ide kattintva elolvashatja a könyv előszavát

Ide kattintva elolvashat egy részletet a könyvből

Money plays an important role in most people’s lives. Some are happy that they have it, and there are some who suffer from the lack of it. Some are penny-pinchers and some who throw their money around.
We use them every day, but do we think about the origin of currency names? Do we know the connection between the florin and the city of Florence? Does it come into our mind where the name dollar comes from or if it is related to the thaler? Does the currency name pound have the same roots as the unit of weight? Do we know whether the German mark, the Greek talanton, and drachma or the Spanish peso has ever been a name of a unit of weight as well? What about the shared meaning of the Polish złoty, the Dutch gulden, and the Swedish öre?
In which country is the memory of Christopher Columbus preserved? Which currency is named after an Indian chief? And where is an exotic bird named on banknotes?
This book deals with the origin and history of 400 currency names from the Georgian abazi to the Hebrew zuz. Apart from the well-known European ones, other continents’ currencies are also present in the work. Today’s official currencies (and subunits) and the significant currencies of the past eras can also be found in this volume.
The author, Sándor Maticsák is a professor at the Department of Finno-Ugric Languages of the University of Debrecen (Hungary). This English-language book is based on his Hungarian-language version published in 2018 (A mókusbőrtől az euróig. Pénznevek etimológiai szótára).