Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2017 April 23

= April 23 =

Unusual symbol
This upcoming Picture of the Day shows a series of old US bills (paper money). There are 7 denominations; the above link will give you one or another at random, and there are links for you to click to see the others. On all 7 denominations, the serial number is followed by a symbol that I've never seen before. It looks something like a Greek letter &Sigma;, but with the top and bottom strokes truncated. It's rendered slightly differently in different denominations, with the top and bottom strokes smaller on the $20 and more like fat triangles on most or all of the higher ones.

I presume the purpose of the symbol is to make it clear that this is the end of the serial number and there isn't another digit, but is there a name for the thing? Have people seen it used in other places? --76.71.6.254 (talk) 21:11, 23 April 2017 (UTC)


 * You can search for it at http://www.symbols.com, in the category "Currency signs".
 * —Wavelength (talk) 22:34, 23 April 2017 (UTC)
 * It's clearly not a currency sign. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 06:03, 24 April 2017 (UTC)


 * This site says "On many early notes, decorative symbols were used instead of letters at the beginning and/or end of a serial number." This gold certificate on eBay has a cross-like symbol at the end. Clarityfiend (talk) 23:16, 23 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Two other such symbols can be seen at Gold certificate—one in the row "$100, 2nd and 3rd" and one in the row "$10, 7th". Loraof (talk) 23:43, 23 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Ah, good responses, thanks. And the sentence that Clarity quoted links to this page where 21 such symbols are tabulated (and there's even a note about how the shape of the &Sigma;-like symbol varied).  The only thing it doesn't say is whether the specific symbols used had names.  It would seem as though people would want to be able to talk about them. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 06:03, 24 April 2017 (UTC)


 * The symbols may have been an early form of error checking or counterfeit detection; if the character was purpose-made by the Bureau of Printing and Engraving to be unique for that bill series, its uniqueness may have been a way to detect a counterfeit bill, as the symbol would not have been part of a standard typeface and would have thus been easier to detect and harder to fake. -- Jayron 32 12:16, 24 April 2017 (UTC)


 * That's my understanding based on the sources already cited, yes. But I still think people would want to be able to talk about them by name so they could say things like "this is supposed to be the 1930 series; it should have the squigglemorph after the serial number, not the bodjickey."  Oh well. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 20:10, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Something is amiss here where the $1,000 banknote image is displayed with texts:
 * Shown here is a $5,000 specimen banknote...
 * Shown here is a $10,000 specimen banknote... Blooteuth (talk) 10:09, 24 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Oh! I thought I'd clicked on the wrong denomination when I was looking at those two.  Thanks for spotting that.  I see it was already reported on the POTD maintainer's talk page a few hours ago. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 20:14, 24 April 2017 (UTC)
 * And it's been fixed. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 04:44, 25 April 2017 (UTC)