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Replies: 17 / Views: 6,368 |
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Valued Member
United States
154 Posts |
Hi all, I have a tricky question that hopefully some of you could help me with. I love coins in different alphabets, especially Arabic and Asian languages, but am especially intrigued by coins with multiple languages. I think I've seen some Hong Kong and Singapore coins that have English and Chinese, but that's about it. Does anyone know how common such coins are, and where in the world I should start looking for them? Thanks!
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Pillar of the Community
Thailand
1509 Posts |
Some Thai 10 Baht coins have Thai and English. Although they are commemorative (ASEAN meetings, Boy Scout jamborees etc) they are put into circulation. If you're interested I'll post some images.
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Valued Member
Pakistan
207 Posts |
Bilingual? How about TRIlingual?! :D Many Pakistani coins are bilingual (featuring both urdu and english), but there are several trilingual ones as well. For example: 
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Valued Member
Israel
423 Posts |
Israeli coins are tri-lingual
Hebrew Arabic and English
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
585 Posts |
China, provincie Sinkiang(Xinjiang) period Guang Xu 3 miscals(3mace) 27mm AH 1320 (1902) Kashgar mint 
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4212 Posts |
been mentioned, sorry.  
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4212 Posts |
Tare dollars are also bi.
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Valued Member
 United States
154 Posts |
Awesome! Wow, I can't believe how fast you all were! The Pakistani and Israeli one were exactly what I was imagining. The Chinese coin is very beautiful as well. Are they hard to come by?
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Pillar of the Community
Germany
1062 Posts |
Bosnian coins and perhaps a few others are in Cyrilic and Roman alphabets, same language though.
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
3831 Posts |
I think you can generally apply this to countries that have been occupied previously hence there might have been the need to use two different languages. This also applies to countries that have history of lots of ethic groups migrating into the country. Here's some of my examples: Hong Kong  Indonesia  Yugoslavia  South Korea  China featuring minor ethnic groups   The list goes on and on.
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Pillar of the Community
Belgium
651 Posts |
Belgium has several bilingual coins (Belgiƫ-Belgique), but issued also some commemorative coins in 4 languages: French, Dutch and German on the obverse and Latin on the reverse. Here's an exempel: the 500 francs 1999 coin commemorating archdukes Albert and Isabella.  
Edited by bart 05/25/2012 1:44 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2605 Posts |
A couple more to add, Straits Settlements (trilingual)  South Africa (bilingual)  Gambia (bilingual)  Many Middle-Eastern countries have legends in Arabic and English, like this Bahrain piece, 
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Rest in Peace
United States
1729 Posts |
This may be stretching it, but a number of coins have been issued with Braille on them. Here's one:  One more: 
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Valued Member
Israel
423 Posts |
Quote: The Pakistani and Israeli one were exactly what I was imagining. The Chinese coin is very beautiful as well. Are they hard to come by?
Sheeptotherescue PM me your address and I will gladly send you some Israeli samples.
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Rest in Peace
United States
9104 Posts |
Lots of countries use more than one language, like Canada (especially on commems).
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Pillar of the Community
Russian Federation
5172 Posts |
Coins of the British Mandate of Palestine are trilingual in the same languages as the later Israeli ones, but much more prominently (the inscriptions take up most of the coin's design instead of being just a side-show as on Israeli pieces). Coincidentally, some Israeli coins have inscriptions in the old Phoenician alphabet (the new series 10 shekels coin even has a several-word one), so they could be considered as having four languages (it's actually three, of course, as "Phoenician" is basically identical to modern Hebrew except for being written in a long-obsolete alphabet). Also, while a Yugoslavian bilingual coin had already been featured, their coins of some 1970s (IIRC) series have four languages on them (all closely related though, and only two alphabets).
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Replies: 17 / Views: 6,368 |