currency

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Medieval Latin currentia, from Latin currēns, from currō.

Pronunciation

Noun

currency (countable and uncountable, plural currencies)

  1. Money or other items used to facilitate transactions.
    Wampum was used as a currency by Amerindians.
  2. (more specifically) Paper money.
    • 1943, William Saroyan, The Human Comedy, chapter 3,
      Spangler went through his pockets, coming out with a handful of small coins, one piece of currency and a hard-boiled egg.
  3. The state of being current; general acceptance or recognition.
    The jargon’s currency.
  4. (obsolete) fluency; readiness of utterance
  5. (obsolete) Current value; general estimation; the rate at which anything is generally valued.
    He […] takes greatness of kingdoms according to their bulk and currency, and not after intrinsic value. — Francis Bacon.
    The bare name of Englishman […] too often gave a transient currency to the worthless and ungrateful. — W. Irving.

Derived terms
  • (economics): fiat currency, closed currency, hard currency, metacurrency

Translations
fluency — see fluency
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
Translations to be checked

See also
  • Category:Currency symbols
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