Numismatikforum

A question. Adding an entry to my notebook this afternoon I noticed the British sixpence and the American dime being used in identical fashion.

I’m wondering whether any German small coins have found their way into the wider culture as below, to mean either a bargain store, or a short distance.

x: This coin displaced an earlier 1938 sixpence, the tired surfaces of which were perhaps evidence of the then burgeoning popularity of the British counterpart to the American “Five and Dime,” the “Sixpenny Store.”

x: It was a 1942 British movie, The First of the Few (in the U.S. it was released as Spitfire), in which a scene set in the ‘30s laid out the qualities that would be required of the new fighter aircraft. She must be able to “turn on a sixpence,” said actor Leslie Howard in a phrase that immediately jumped out at me because of its similarity to the American “turn on a dime.” By the time this 1942 sixpence was coined—it may have been spent at a movie theater watching The First of the Few—the RAF Spitfire had become a part of British folklore. American dimes, however, didn’t get spent at the movies watching Spitfire until it was released in the U.S. in mid-’43. By that time Leslie Howard was dead, killed in a DC3 transport plane shot down by the Luftwaffe.

I note that Americans also say “stop on a dime,” so it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that British English has also seen the phrase “stop on sixpence”

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Anyone know of a German small coin used likewise? If so, I’d sure appreciate hearing about it.

v.

Not the 50- pfennig, but the 10 - pfennig (Groschen ) and the 1- pfennig.
We have several phrases like "Groschengrab " or Groschenheft " , relating to gamblingmachines or vendingmachines and magazins in a rather negative attitude. If you are realy highhealed, you might find it challanging ( or perhaps not ) to walk om your "Pfennigabsaetze "

And not to forget : Ist der Groschen gefallen ? , meening : " Did you get the hang of it" and deriving from the old public payphones, where you could watch your coins slipping down into a slot when the connection was established. The charge for a local call was 20 Pfennig, so you needed 20 Groschen to get on line.

And last but not least : Der falsche Fuffziger.
" Er ist ein falscher Fuffziger " = You can not trust him
This one is particullary funny, as it is wrongly asumed that the phrase originates from the 50- pfennig- coin struck from 1923 to 25 . I was quit surprised when I learned that this was not so : http://www.numismatikforum.de/viewtopic ... er#p440007

I had not seen your post on the "falsche Fuffziger" (and the related reading) until tonight. Wow! Perfect. But I got deep into it and I see it's now(!) 0400 and my wife will kill me for sure, so I'll quickly note the following and then try to slip into bed undetected....

Groschen, payphones and the idiomatic "I understand: Mexico has had a similar expression that derives from its long-time telephone coin, the "Pyramid" 20-centavo of 1943-1974. There the expression (more common among older folks) implied a little...slowness. "Oh, now I heard the 20 drop."

Thanks much for the reply. I hope to digest more of it tomorrow--my imminent demise notwithstanding.

Is the groschen/payphone thing confined to the 10-pfennig coins of 1949-on?

v.

Mynter hat geschrieben: "Pfennigabsaetze "

Could I please have some help with this one? My online translator seems to be afraid of it.

V.

villa66 hat geschrieben:

Mynter hat geschrieben: "Pfennigabsaetze "

Could I please have some help with this one? My online translator seems to be afraid of it.

V.

Absatz ( the plural is Absaetze ) meens heel. Pfennigabsatz refers to a heel as thin as a column of stacked up pfennig- coins.

in english: stiletto heel

shanxi hat geschrieben:in english: stiletto heel

Exactly what came to mind the moment I read Mynter's "stacked up ofennig coins."

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I know it's summertime and fun is plentiful, so replies, answers and comments are appreciated, but none are expected.

For my own part, I hope you all will forgive me if I write "summer-style" for a while.

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Comparative numismatics. Tremendous fun! I was thinking the pfennig-sized bottom of a high-heel shoe--a 2D metaphor of the "turn on a sixpence" or "stop on a dime" kind.

Instead we're talking a 3D coin metaphor--the shaft of a stiletto heel--and it's a struggle for me to come up with a 3D coin metaphor in American English.

Americans often use familiar coins to call out the size of hailstones. ("dime-size hail," "quarter-size hail." Is this done in Deutschland, or somewhere else anyone knows of?

But back to that stack of pfennigs. Interesting how threat or danger is implicit in the knife/dagger imagery of a stiletto heel, but Germans can get there with the innocence of a stack of little coins.

So I have this mental picture of a stack of 1-pfennig coins. But what kind of pfennigs am I looking at? How old is the usage? Am I looking only at pfennigs of the Bundesrepublik and the avant-garde fashions of the '60s, or the disco days of the late-70s and early-80s? So Bundesrepubik pfennigs only?

Or is it an older idiom? Can I also picture a stack of Weimar pfennigs and link them to the Berlin of the 1920s?

I apologize for this trafficking in caricatures.

But I guess Caricature is how we understand our neighbors. Hell, how we understand ourselves--our history is Caricature. It;s the best we can do. Blah blah.

So can I also picture a stack of Weimar pfennigs? Was the use in the language that long ago? Because--as I've learned here on the Forum--that means I can also pictue the little copper pfennigs of the Kaiserrech within that stack of coins. Within that metaphor for stiletto heels. And whatever those shoes might have been doing, at the time a particular coin...and etc.

Got to go right now.

How old is this "stack of pfennigs = stiletto heel" linguistic usage, I wonder?

v.

According to Kueppers " Woerterbuch der deutschen Umgangssprache ", Pfennigabsatz was first noted in 1955, so we are talking Wirtschaftswunder.

Mynter hat geschrieben:According to Kueppers " Woerterbuch der deutschen Umgangssprache ", Pfennigabsatz was first noted in 1955, so we are talking Wirtschaftswunder.

Dang. Back to earth. But many thanks for the quick, solid answer.

v.

villa66 hat geschrieben:

Mynter hat geschrieben:According to Kueppers " Woerterbuch der deutschen Umgangssprache ", Pfennigabsatz was first noted in 1955, so we are talking Wirtschaftswunder.

Dang. Back to earth. But many thanks for the quick, solid answer.

v.

Sorry about that. Being noted and quoted by the author of a dictionary could of course mean that the word had been in use for some time before it was recorded. Then again, when started stilleto heels to be en vogue ? Could we imagine a german Fräulein stabbing around on WWII zink- pfennigcoins , or a East- Berlin- lady on aluminium - heels ? Cobber- claded steel in any case seems to be more secure.

[quote="Mynter]...Being noted and quoted by the author of a dictionary could of course mean that the word had been in use for some time before it was recorded. [/quote]

Absolutely right. I remember years ago browsing the Addenda of new words that was a part of the 1933 (I believe) edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. "Talkie" was there--but of course; talking motion pictures were relatively new.

Then I saw "dreadnought." It had been in the language for a generation, and still hadn't found its way into the main body of the dictionary. Gave me a good lesson in the time lags that are sometimes at work.

Here, though, it looks like the Lander/Bundesrepublik pfennigs are indeed the ones implicated, just as you suggested.

More tomorrow (I'll write up my notebook entry), but do let me close by getting it clearly on the record that there was no way zinc pfennigs were going to get into any of my own mental pictures of stiletto heels. I mean, which one of these things does not belong: glamour, sex, fashion models on the runway, zinc?

But then maybe yes. Zinc might just be the perfect coinage metal for associating with stiletto heels--it's flashy at first, but fundamentally unsound--and it quickly goes wrong.

v.

My notebook entry for the 1950d pfennig. Corrections are most welcome. Please.

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x: The Länder pfennigs of 1948-49 morphed into the new Bundesrepublik coinage beginning with the issues of 1950. The Wirtschaftswunder (“Economic Miracle”) was underway, and soon there would be time for the little luxuries of life. Like French fashion design, for one. Which brings us back to this 1950d 1-pfennig. Well, to stacks of these little coins. According to Kueppers Woerterbuch der deutschen Umgangssprache (“Dictionary of German Slang”), Pfennigabsätze (“pfennig-stacks,” aka “stiletto heels”) was first noted in 1955. Together with my coin-friend Mynter, on the Numismatikforum, I briefly considered the several types of pfennig that might have been the original inspiration for the slang “pfennig-stacks”—copper, aluminum, zinc, copper-plated steel. But the chronologies involved quickly resolved the question in favor of Bundesrepublik steel. (Which is especially appropriate, because it was steel that made stiletto heels widely available.) finally, I note these 1950 pfennigs were coined with a frozen date until 1966, by which time the high fashion fad known in the U.S. as “stiletto heels” had come and gone. (x)

v.