Another Day, Another Dollar Trivia Quiz

Answer: Dollar

The Bermudian dollar was established in 1970, and while Bermuda is a British Overseas Territory, the Bermudian dollar is tied to the US Dollar, and has been since 1972.

Prior to 1970, the history of currency in Bermuda began with Spanish colonialism. Spanish dollars, or 'pieces of eight,' were the currency of choice in the entire region until Bermuda minted their own money called 'hogge money' in 1612. The British eventually established the pound sterling in all of their colonies in 1825. This remained the Bermudian currency until 1970, when Bermuda took on their own Bermudian dollar.

Answer: Dollar

As with Bermuda, the earliest currency used in Jamaica was the Spanish dollar, AKA 'pieces of eight.' And as a British colony, Jamaica took on their sterling coinage in 1825. The first banknotes were released in 1905, undergoing various denomination additions and changes until the Jamaican parliament voted to decimalize their currency in 1968.

The Jamaican dollar replaced the Jamaican pound, but unlike their Bermudian counterparts in this quiz, the Jamaican dollar was not tied to the US dollar, but rather remained related to British currency, at a value of approximately half a British pound (at the time of its introduction).

Answer: Dollar

The first official currency in New Zealand came with the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, and the subsequent inclusion of New Zealand as a colony within the British Empire. The British pound sterling would fill the role (although Australian coinage was also common) until the colony made its own version - the New Zealand pound - in 1933.

The New Zealand pound lasted for over 40 years, until the government decided to decimalize their currency (in 1964), issuing their first new dollars in 1967. At the time this was being debated, some other ideas had been floated for an alternative currency name, including 'ferns,' 'kiwis,' and 'zeals,' but they decided to stick with the familiar (in other countries, including neighbouring Australia) dollar.

Answer: Euro

Cyprus became a member of the European Union in 2004, adopting the euro as its official currency, effective January 1st, 2008.

Backing up just a little bit, the first coins were believed to have been minted on Cyprus in the 6th century... B.C.! The long history of the intervening years saw many different currencies make there way into officialdom on the island. Jumping to 'recent' history, it was during the Russo-Turkish War in 1878 that the Cyprus Convention granted administrative control of the island to the British Empire (even though it was still a province within the Ottoman Empire).

Even though it wasn't really their place to do so, the British then introduced the Cypriot pound as the currency of Cyprus... which eventually became official when they annexed the island at the outset of World War I. The pound remained the currency of Cyprus even after the country gained its independence from the UK, although it was no longer pegged to the British pound after 1972. The Cypriot pound was then replaced by the euro in 2008.

Answer: Euro

The history of the Estonian peoples is as convoluted as the overall history of continental Europe, so I will begin with the advent of the Republic of Estonia in the aftermath of World War I.

As the Russians withdrew in 1918 and the Germans moved in, Estonia declared its independence from Russian control. The German occupiers didn't acknowledge the claim until after the war when they turned over control of the region to the local government. It wasn't quite that easy, as Russia tried to reclaim the region, and the Estonian War of Independence ensued, ending in 1920 when the Tartu Peace Treaty was signed by the Republic of Estonia and Bolshevik Russia.

The first, short-lived currency produced in Estonia was the Estonian Mark in 1918, modelled after the currency of its German occupiers. That lasted until the Kroon was established in 1924. When the Soviet Union took control of the country in 1940, the Kroon ceased to be circulated and the Soviet currency (the rouble). Things were confused by World War II, but after the war, the rouble remained the currency in Estonia until 1992 and a newfound independence brought back the Kroon.

Nearly 20 years later, the advent of the euro eventually reached Estonia, and it was adopted as the official currency on January 1st, 2011.

Answer: Euro

Slovenia (and its currencies) have a long history including being part of the Roman Empire for centuries. For purposes of brevity, I will cover recent history from the formation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes in 1918 at the conclusion of World War I. The name was formally changed to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929, but this short-lived monarchy would only survive until World War II. During this interwar period, there were two currencies used in the kingdom: the Yugoslav krone (1918-20) and the Yugoslav dinar (1920-1941).

As World War II neared its conclusion, Slovenia became part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, which was declared on November 29th, 1943. The Yugoslav dinar was re-established as the currency of the new Eastern Bloc nation, and would remain so until Yugoslavia dissolved at the end of the Cold War. The sovereign and independent Republic of Slovenia was born in 1991, and with it, a new currency in the form of the Slovenian tolar was established.

The Slovenian tolar lasted until Slovenia took on the euro as the national currency, effective January 1st, 2007.

Answer: Peso

After Spanish pieces of eight, Argentina began producing their own currency after gaining their independence in 1816, originally denominated in reales, soles and escudos, including silver eight-real (or sol) coins still known as pesos. Two different paper currencies, called pesos fuertes and peso moneda corriente, were issued beginning in 1826.

The monetary system was updated in 1881, and over the next (near) century, the peso moneda corriente (national currency) took over. At the same time, until 1929, there were also gold coins called peso oro sellado.

The peso ley took over in 1970, and lasted until 1983, when the peso argentino replaced it. That only lasted until 1985, as the Argentine austral became the new currency.

The austral suffered from a period of hyperinflation, and was replaced in 1992 by the peso convertible. Tied to the US dollar, the peso convertible replaced the austral at a rate of 1 peso to 10,000 australes.

Answer: Peso

Prior to 1857, the coinage that circulated in Cuba was the real, both the Spanish and Spanish colonial varieties. In that year, Cuban pesos (valued at 8 reales each) were issued for the first time. They were issued as banknotes, and until 1915, there were no Cuban coins issued.

From 1881, the Cuban peso was pegged to the US dollar, but that changed when Fidel Castro instituted the socialist planned economy, pegging the peso to the Soviet ruble. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, a period of economic flux brought changes to Cuba. The US dollar was accepted as legal currency (this lasted until 2004), and the peso became the Cuban convertible peso (CUC), also pegged to the US dollar for its value.

The CUC was officially retired in 2021, and the Cuban peso (CUP) resumed its status as the moneda nacional.

Answer: Peso

Prior to the arrival of the Spanish in 1521, there were various forms of currency used in the Philippines, including cowry shells (produced in gold, jade, quartz and wood), as well as gold coinage called piloncitos and silver salapi (rupees and rupiah from India and Indonesia).

With Spanish occupation of the Philippines, however, came the Spanish pieces of eight (silver pesos), although the piloncitos continued to be used, given a value of a half-peso coin. Philippine variants of the Spanish coin began to be produced, or reminted from imported Mexican pesos. The first paper money (the Philippine peso fuerte) would not be produced in the Philippines until 1851 by the country's first bank, the El Banco Espaņol Filipino de Isabel II.

American colonial influence and Japanese occupation during World War II also affected the coins being minted in the Philippines, although they retained the name of peso during those times. With independence in the 20th century, the currency eventually adopted wordage in the Filipino language, changing 'peso' and 'centavo' to 'piso' and 'sentimo.'

Answer: Dinar

Before the French occupied the region that would become known as Algeria, the currency used in the area was the budju. After the French established their colony in 1848, they introduced the franc as a new currency. This lasted for over 100 years until 1960 when it was revalued and became the Algerian new franc.

The new franc was short-lived as Algeria gained independence in 1962, and on April 1st, 1964, the Algerian dinar came into existence. The origin of the term 'dinar' goes back to the Roman denarius.

Answer: Dinar

The Ottoman Empire encompassed modern-day Iraq - then called Mesopotamia - until World War I when the British conquered the region in 1917. From that point until the end of the British Mandate in 1932, the Indian rupee was the currency utilized in the Kingdom of Iraq. With Iraqi independence, the Iraqi dinar became the new currency.

Interestingly, the dinars produced prior to the Gulf War were referred to as 'Swiss dinars,' even though the origins of the term are ambiguous, considering that the bills were printed in England. Under Saddam Hussein's rule, new (lower quality) bills were produced that became known as 'Saddam dinars.'

Following the war and Saddam's fall, new banknotes were produced, using modern anti-counterfeiting techniques.

Answer: Dinar

In Serbia, the dinar was originally introduced in the 13th century, remaining the primary currency until the Ottoman occupation of the region in 1459. For the next four centuries, different foreign currencies were common, even after the formal establishment of the Principality of Serbia in 1817. It was not until 1868 after the last Ottoman garrisons withdrew that Prince Mihailo Obrenović established a modern Serbian dinar.

The end of World War I brought a new currency as Serbia became part of Yugoslavia, and the Yugoslav dinar cocirculated with the Yugoslav krone until the second iteration of the Serbian dinar briefly came into existence under German occupation during World War II. The Yugoslav dinar was reintroduced in 1944.

With the dissolution of Yugoslavia came the creation of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro in 2003. Different currencies were used, with Serbia using the (now) Serbian dinar, while Montenegro (and Kosovo) adopted the Deutschemark and later the Euro. When the union broke up in 2006, the 2003-issue Serbian dinar continued to be used in the new Republic of Serbia.

Answer: Pound

The first currency minted in Egypt dates back to the 4th century BC, during the reign of pharaoh Teos of the 30th Dynasty. These gold staters were based off of similar Greek coins that had been in circulation from the 8th century BC.

More recently, the Egyptian piastre came into use in 1834 in the form of gold and silver coins, modelled after the Turkish kuruş, used during the Ottoman occupation of Egypt. Two years later (1836), the first Egyptian pounds were introduced, with the piastre remaining as 1/100 of a pound.

Answer: Pound

Through much of its history, the Sudan relied on money imported from Egypt, so whatever currency was being used in Egypt through different eras could also be found in the Sudan. It wasn't until 1885 that the Mahdi introduced the first coins.

Between 1899 and 1956, the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium saw both British pound sterling coins and Egyptian pound banknotes in circulation. Once the Sudan achieved its independence, it established the Sudanese pound, on par with the Egyptian pound, on April 8, 1957.

The Sudanese dinar was established in 1992, supplementing the pound, and for a few years they were both in circulation. The pound, however, was discontinued in 1999, officially. This wasn't really how things worked in reality, as the pound was still circulated in southern Sudan.

In 2007, as part of the peace agreement between the government of the Republic of the Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement, a new Sudanese pound was issued for the whole of the country. With the secession of South Sudan in 2011, a new edition of the Sudanese pound was established, and ceased to be legal tender in South Sudan.

Answer: Pound

As with many other countries in the region, Syria was once a part of the Ottoman Empire, for about 400 years. With the end of that empire, Syria fell under occupation by the French, and for a short time, the Egyptian pound was used as a currency for Syria (as well as for Transjordan and Lebanon). But in short order (1919), France instituted a new currency - the Syro-Lebanese pound (or 'livre' in French), valued at 20 francs per pound. This lasted for 15 years, at which point the joint currency was split into Syrian and Lebanese pounds.

In 1958, the French language was removed from Syrian bills and coins, and was replaced by English. Arabic, of course, is (and was) also present on the bills and coins.