Coins of Australia Coins of Australia Australian coins refers to the coins which are or were in use as Australian currency. During the early days of the colonies that formed Australia, foreign currency was used, but in 1910, a decade after federation, Australian coins were introduced. Australia used pounds, shillings and pence until 1966, when it adopted the decimal system with the Australian dollar divided into 100 cents. With the exception of the first Proclamation Coinage and the holey dollars, all Australian coins remain legal tender despite being withdrawn from circulation. For many years after the first Australian colony, New South Wales, was
Decimal fractions. The Egyptian hieratic numerals, the Greek alphabet numerals, the Hebrew alphabet numerals, the Roman numerals, the Chinese numerals and early Indian Brahmi numerals are all non-positional decimal systems, and required large numbers of symbols. For instance, Egyptian numerals used different symbols for 10, 20, to 90, 100, 200, to 900, 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000, to 10,000. The world's earliest positional decimal system was the Chinese rod calculus. Decimal fractions were first developed and used by the Chinese in the end of 4th century BC, and then spread to the Middle East and from there to Europe. The written Chinese