Wheel of Time MUD

I always kind of wondered why people in the books treated 1 gold crown as a good amount of money in the books. (I played the game before I got deep into the books.) Jordan explained the currency here if you're interested.


QUESTION

What is the currency break down for Wheel of Time? How many coppers make up a silver penny? How many silver pennies equal a silver mark? How many silver marks make up a gold mark?

ROBERT JORDAN

This varies from country to country, along with the sizes and weights of the various coins, the reason that bankers and others—such as Bran al'Vere—use scales for comparing coins. The heaviest coins in weight of precious metal come from Andor and Tar Valon. For the coins of those two, the scale is very simple.

Ten copper pennies = one silver penny.

One hundred silver pennies = one silver mark.

Ten silver marks = one silver crown.

Ten silver crowns = one gold mark.

Ten gold marks = one gold crown.

As an example of other countries' currencies, the scale for Altara, where the weight of silver or gold in larger coins is less than that in Andor or Tar Valon, is this:

Ten copper pennies = one silver penny.

Twenty-one silver pennies = one silver mark.

Twenty silver marks = one silver crown.

Twenty silver crowns = one gold mark.

Twenty gold marks = one gold crown.

Sure as heck beats the Harry Potter system of currency!

Wizarding money comes in three denominations: bronze Knuts, silver Sickles, and golden Galleons. There are 29 Knuts in one Sickle, and 17 Sickles make up a Galleon.

Imagine how much of a pain it would be to do transactions using two prime numbers instead of base 10??

The Harry Potter thing is not surprising, considering this:

"Under this system, there were 12 pence in a shilling and 20 shillings, or 240 pence, in a pound. The penny was subdivided into 4 farthings until 31 December 1960, when they ceased to be legal tender in the UK, and until 31 July 1969 there were also halfpennies ("ha'pennies") in circulation. The advantage of such a system was its use in mental arithmetic, as it afforded many factors and hence fractions of a pound such as tenths, eighths, sixths and even sevenths and ninths if the guinea (worth 21 shillings) was used."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C2%A3sd

And: On 15 February 1971, known as Decimal Day, the United Kingdom and Ireland decimalised their currencies.

And 25000 gold crowns buys a heron sword these days. How would one carry that much gold if it actually existed in person, or perhaps how much does 1 crown weigh if we are using scales?