Groat (coin) Groat (coin) The groat is the traditional name of a long-defunct English and Irish silver coin worth four pence, and also a Scottish coin originally worth fourpence, with later issues being valued at eightpence and one shilling. The name has also been applied to any thick or large coin, such as the "Groschen" ("grosso"), a silver coin issued by Tyrol in 1271 and Venice in the 13th century, which was the first of this general size to circulate in the Holy Roman Empire and other parts of Europe. The immediate ancestor to the groat was the French "gros tournois" or
Twopence (British pre-decimal coin) terms of pence, e.g. eight pence would be 8d. These coins were made legal tender for amounts of up to one shilling by a proclamation of 26 July 1797. They were later made redundant in 1860 with the advent of bronze coinage. The minting of silver pennies for general circulation was halted by the British government in 1660, because the cost of silver had risen too high. By the late 1700s this policy had caused a deficiency in the number of circulating pennies, and many merchants and mining companies had taken to issuing their own copper tokens. For example, the