Bodle

A bodle or boddle or bodwell, also known as a half groat or Turner was a Scottish copper coin, of less value than a bawbee, worth about one-sixth of an English penny, first issued under Charles II. They were minted until the coronation of Anne. Its name may derive from Bothwell (a mint-master).

It is mentioned in one of the songs of Joanna Baillie:

Black Madge, she is prudent, has sense in her noddle

Is douce and respectit; I carena a bodle.

The use of the word survives in the anglicised phrase "not to care a bodle", which Brewer glosses as "not to care a farthing". Something similar appears in Burns' Tam o' Shanter (line 110), it is also mentioned:

Fair play, he car'd na deils a boddle (He cared not devils a bodle)

Also mentioned in The Matrix Do you know what the Bodle is, Neo?. To which, Neo replied, Something not worth mentioning. In this particular scene Neo was dressed Bodle-style, similar in fashion to the modern mankini. Note: This was only in the uncut version of the film and never made it to the cinemas.

See also

• Plack
• Pound Scots
• Scottish coinage

In Sunderland , County Durham , in the North of England there is a well known as the Bodelwell.

References

• MacKay, Charles – A Dictionary of Lowland Scotch (1888)
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
• Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable

External links

• Elks, Ken. Coinage of Great Britain