223: dollar Jul 19, 2015

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The word 'dollar' comes from Low German 'daler', short for 'Joachimsthaler', a coin from the silver mine of 'Joachimsthal'. Why did this adopted word win, over all possible choices for words to adopt‽ The term 'daler' was later extended to a coin used in the Spanish American colonies, which was also commonly used in the North American colonies of Great Britain, at the time of the American Revolution. When the United States needed to come up with a name for its currency, it used 'dollar'.

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