Reflections on the Threepenny Bit (revised and re-posted)

While going through an old chest of drawers I recently came across an old twelve-sided threepenny bit. Most people don���t remember these coins, but to me they were once part of daily life. One of them would once have bought you a national newspaper or a very small chocolate bar. Technically, they were worth a little more than one of the decimal pennies (always known scornfully as ���pee���) which were introduced during that year of revolution, 1971. The ythreepenny bit was a dead thing when I f...