Ottoman lira

The pound or lira (sign: LT; Ottoman Turkish: ليرا, romanized: līrā; French: livre turque; Greek: οθωμανική λίρα, romanized: othomanikí líra; Armenian: Օսմանյան լիրա, romanized: Osmanyan lira; Arabic: ليرة عثمانية, romanized: līra, lēra ʕuṯmāniyya) was the currency of the Ottoman Empire from 1844 until 1927, when it was replaced by the Turkish lira. Although the Ottoman Empire was abolished in 1922, the Ottoman lira remained in circulation until the end of 1927, as the Republic of Turkey that succeeded it was not in a position to issue its own banknotes yet in its early years. The Ottoman lira replaced the piastre (Turkish: kuruş) as the principal unit of currency in the Ottoman Empire, with the piastre continuing to circulate as a subdivision of the lira, with 100 piastres = 1 lira. The para also continued to be used, with 40 para = 1 piastre. Until the 1930s and the Turkish alphabet reform, the Arabic script was used on Turkish coins and banknotes, with پاره for para, قروش for kuruş and ليرا for lira (تورك ليراسي for 'Turkish lira'). In European languages, the kuruş was known as the piastre, whilst the lira was known as the livre in French and the pound in English. English-language publications used "£T" as the sign for the currency, but it is unknown whether it was ever used natively. Between 1844 and 1881, the lira was on a bimetallic standard, with LT 1 = 6.61519 grams pure gold (roughly 9⁄10 of a British Sovereign) = 99.8292 grams pure silver. In 1881, the gold standard was adopted and continued until 1914. World War I saw Turkey effectively depart from the gold standard with the gold lira being worth about LT 9 in paper money by the early 1920s. Between 1844 and 1855, coins were introduced in denominations of...