In British English, prior to decimalization, values from two to eleven pence and to a lesser extent 18 pence, were often written and spoken as a single word, as "twopence" or "tuppence", "threepence" or "thruppence", etc. (Other values were usually expressed in terms of shillings and pence or written as two words, which might or might not be hyphenated.) Where a single coin represented a number of pence, it was treated as a single noun, as "a sixpence". Thus, "a threepence" (but more usually "a threepenny bit") would be single coin of that value whereas "three pence" would be its value and "three pennies" would be three penny coins. In British English, divisions of a penny were added to such combinations without a conjunction, as "sixpence-farthing", and such constructions were also treated as single nouns. Adjectival use of such coins used the ending -penny, as "sixpenny".